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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Winning Clue, by James Hay, Jr.
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Winning Clue
+
+
+Author: James Hay, Jr.
+
+
+
+Release Date: December 20, 2006  [eBook #20152]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WINNING CLUE***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Garcia, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/c/)
+
+
+
+THE WINNING CLUE
+
+by
+
+JAMES HAY, Jr.
+
+Author of The Man Who Forgot, Etc.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Grosset & Dunlap
+Publishers New York
+Copyright, 1919
+By Dodd, Mead and Company, Inc.
+
+
+
+TO GRAHAM B. NICHOL
+AS A LITTLE TOKEN OF MY ADMIRATION AND AFFECTION
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAPTER
+
+      I. Strangled
+
+     II. "Something Big in It"
+
+    III. The Ruby Ring
+
+     IV. Two Trails
+
+      V. The Husband's Story
+
+     VI.  Morley Is in a Hurry
+
+    VII. Miss Fulton Is Hysterical
+
+   VIII. The Breath of Scandal
+
+     IX. Women's Nerves
+
+      X. Eyes of Accusation
+
+     XI. The $1,000 Check
+
+    XII. The Man with the Gold Tooth
+
+   XIII. Lucy Thomas Talks
+
+    XIV. The Pawn Broker Takes the Trail
+
+     XV. Braceway Sees a Light
+
+    XVI. A Message from Miss Fulton
+
+   XVII. Miss Fulton's Revelation
+
+  XVIII. What's Braceway's Game?
+
+    XIX. At the Anderson National Bank
+
+     XX. The Discovery of the Jewels
+
+    XXI. Bristow Solves a Problem
+
+   XXII. A Confession
+
+  XXIII. On the Rack
+
+   XXIV.  Miss Fulton Writes a Letter
+
+    XXV. A Mystifying Telegram
+
+   XXVI. Wanted: Vengeance
+
+  XXVII. The Revelation
+
+ XXVIII. Confession Voluntary
+
+   XXIX. The Last Card
+
+
+
+
+THE WINNING CLUE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+STRANGLED
+
+
+When a woman's voice, pitched to the high note of utter terror, rang out
+on the late morning quiet of Manniston Road, Lawrence Bristow looked up
+from his newspaper quickly but vaguely, as if he doubted his own ears. He
+was reading an account of a murder committed in Waukesha, Wisconsin, and
+the shrieks he had just heard fitted in so well with the paragraph then
+before his eyes that his imagination might have been playing him tricks.
+He was allowed, however, little time for speculation or doubt.
+
+"Murder! Help!" cried the woman in a staccato sharpness that carried the
+length of many blocks.
+
+Bristow sprang to his feet and started down the short flight of stairs
+leading from his porch to the street. Before he had taken three steps, he
+saw the frightened girl standing on the porch of No. 5, two doors to his
+left. Although he was lame, he displayed surprising agility. His left
+leg, two inches shorter than the right and supported by a steel brace
+from foot to thigh, did not prevent his being the first to reach the
+young woman's side.
+
+Late as it was, half-past ten, she was not fully dressed. She wore a
+kimono of light, sheer material which, clutched spasmodically about her,
+revealed the slightness and grace of her figure. Her fair hair hung down
+her back in a long, thick braid.
+
+Neighbours across the street and further up Manniston Road were out on
+their porches now or starting toward No. 5. All of them were women.
+
+The girl--she was barely past twenty, he thought--stopped screaming, and,
+her hands pressed to her throat and cheeks, stared wildly from him toward
+the front door, which was standing open. He entered the living room of
+the one-story bungalow. A foot within the doorway, he stood stock still.
+On the sofa against the opposite wall he saw another woman. He knew at
+first glance that she was dead.
+
+The body was in a curious position. Apparently, before death had come,
+the victim had been sitting on the sofa, and, in dying, her body had
+crumpled over from the waist toward the right, so that now the lower part
+of her occupied the attitude of sitting while the upper half reclined as
+if in the posture of natural sleep. One thing which, perhaps, added to
+the gruesomeness of the sight was that she had on evening dress, a gown
+of pale blue satin embellished in unerring taste with real old Irish
+lace.
+
+Although the face had been beautiful under its crown of luxuriant black
+hair, it now was distorted. While the eyes were closed, the mouth was
+open, very wide--an ugly, repulsive gape.
+
+He was aware that the woman in the kimono was just behind him--he could
+feel her hot breath against the back of his neck--and that behind her
+pressed the neighbours, their number augmented by the arrival of two men.
+He turned and faced them.
+
+"Call a doctor--and the police, somebody, will you?" he said sharply.
+
+"They have a telephone back there in the dining room," volunteered one of
+the women on the porch.
+
+Another, a Mrs. Allen who lived in No. 6, had put her arms around the
+terrified girl and was forcing her into an armchair on the porch.
+
+The others started into the living room.
+
+"Wait a moment," cautioned Bristow. "Don't come in here yet. The police
+will want to find things undisturbed. It looks like murder."
+
+They obeyed him without question. He was about forty years old, of medium
+height and with good shoulders, but his chest was too flat, and his face
+showed an unnatural flush. His mere physique was not one to force
+obedience from others. It was in his eyes, dark-brown and lit with a
+peculiar flaming intensity, that they read his right to command.
+
+"Please go through this room to the telephone and call a doctor," he
+said, singling out the woman who had spoken.
+
+His voice, a deep barytone with a pleasant note, was perfectly steady. He
+seemed to hold their excitement easily within bounds.
+
+The woman he had addressed complied with his suggestion. While she was
+doing so, he crossed over to the sofa and put his hand to the wrist of
+the murdered woman. In order to do that, he had to move a fold of the
+gown which partially concealed it. The flesh was cold, and he shivered
+slightly, readjusting the satin to exactly the fold in which he had found
+it.
+
+"Too late for a doctor to help now," he threw back over his shoulder.
+
+They watched him silently. Low moans were coming constantly from the
+woman in the chair on the porch.
+
+Bristow took the telephone in his turn and called up police headquarters.
+
+The chief of police, whom he knew, answered the call.
+
+"Hello! Captain Greenleaf?" asked the lame man.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"There's been a murder at Number Five, Manniston Road. This is Lawrence
+Bristow, of Number Nine."
+
+"Aw, quit your kiddin'," laughed Greenleaf. "What do you want to do, get
+me up there to hear another of your theories about----"
+
+"This is no joke," snapped Bristow. "I tell you one of the women in
+Number Five has been murdered. Come----"
+
+But the chief, recognizing the urgency in the summons, had left the
+telephone and was on his way.
+
+As Bristow turned toward the living room, Mrs. Allen and another woman
+were carrying the hysterical, moaning girl from the front porch to one
+of the two bedrooms in the bungalow. Some of the others again started
+into the living room.
+
+"Let's wait," he cautioned once more. "If we get to moving around in here
+we may destroy any clues that could be used later."
+
+When they fell back a little, he joined them on the porch, standing
+always so that he could watch the body and see that no one changed its
+attitude or even approached it. His eyes studied keenly all the furniture
+in the room. Save for one overturned stiff-backed chair, it apparently
+had not been disturbed.
+
+The doctor arrived and, waiting for no information, approached the
+murdered woman. As Bristow had done, he touched her wrist, and then
+slipped his hand beneath her corsage so that it rested above her heart.
+He straightened up almost immediately.
+
+"Dead," he said to Bristow; "dead for hours."
+
+The physician became conscious of the hysterical girl's moans, took a
+step toward the bedrooms and paused.
+
+"That's right, doctor," Bristow told him. "They need you back there."
+
+The doctor hurried out.
+
+"That is--that was Mrs. Withers, wasn't it?" Bristow, looking at the dead
+body, asked of the group.
+
+"Yes; and the other is her sister, Miss Fulton," one of them answered.
+
+Bristow had seemed to all of them a peculiar man--too quiet and
+reserved--ever since he had come to No. 9 four months before. They
+remembered this now, when he seemed scarcely conscious of the identity of
+the two girls who had lived almost next door to him during all that time.
+
+Different members of the crowd gave him information: Miss Maria Fulton,
+like nearly everybody else on Manniston Road, had tuberculosis, and Mrs.
+Withers had been living with her. They had plenty of money--not rich,
+perhaps, but able to have all the comforts and most of the luxuries of
+life. They were here in the hope that Furmville's climate would restore
+Miss Fulton's health.
+
+Their coloured cook-and-maid had not come to work that morning, it
+seemed, and Miss Fulton, who was the younger of the two sisters, was on
+the "rest" cure, ordered by the doctor to stay in bed day and night.
+Perhaps that was why she had not discovered Mrs. Withers' body earlier in
+the day.
+
+They gossiped on.
+
+It was like a lesson in immortality--the dead body, with distorted face
+and twisted limbs, just inside the room; and outside, in the low-toned
+phrases of the awed women, swift and vivid pictures of what she; when
+alive, had said and done and seemed.
+
+"Everybody liked her. If somebody had come and told me a woman living on
+Manniston Road had been killed, she would have been the last one I'd have
+thought of as the victim." "All the other beautiful women I ever knew
+were stupid; she wasn't." "Her husband couldn't come to Furmville very
+often." "Loveliest black hair I _ever_ saw." "She used to be----"
+
+Then followed quick glimpses of her life as they had seen or heard it: a
+dance at Maplewood Inn where she had been the undisputed belle; a novel
+she had liked; a big reception at the White House in Washington when,
+during the year of her début, the French ambassador had called her "the
+most beautiful American," and the newspapers had made much of it; an
+emerald ring she had worn; the unfailing good humour she had always shown
+in the tedious routine of nursing her sister--and so on, a mass of facts
+and impressions which were, simultaneously, a little biography of her and
+an unaffected appreciation of the way she had touched and coloured their
+lives.
+
+Captain Greenleaf, with one of the plain-clothes men of his force, came
+hurrying up the steps. The crowd fell back, gave them passage, and closed
+in again.
+
+"Nothing's been disturbed, captain," said Bristow.
+
+"Where is she?" asked Greenleaf anxiously. He was not accustomed to
+murder cases.
+
+He caught sight of the body on the sofa.
+
+"God!" he said in a low tone, and turned toward the plain-clothes man:
+
+"Come on in, Jenkins--you, too, Mr. Bristow."
+
+The three entered the living room, and Greenleaf, with a muttered word of
+apology to the on-lookers, closed the door in their faces.
+
+He, too, did what Bristow had done--put his fingers on the dead woman's
+wrist. He was breathing rapidly, and his hand shook. Jenkins stood
+motionless. He also was overwhelmed by the tragedy. Besides, he was not
+cut out for work of this kind. In looking for illicit distillers and
+boot-leggers, or negroes charged with theft, he was in his element, but
+this sort of thing was new to him. He had no idea of where to turn or
+what to do.
+
+"She's dead," Bristow said to the captain. "The doctor says she has been
+dead a long time--hours."
+
+"Where's the doctor?"
+
+"Back there. Miss Fulton, the sister, is hysterical with fright."
+
+"Who sent for the doctor?"
+
+"I did. I asked one of the women here to telephone."
+
+"Then I'll call the coroner."
+
+He stepped through the open folding doors into the dining room and
+took down the receiver, looking, as he did so, at the body and its
+surroundings.
+
+Bristow stooped down, picked up something from the floor near the sofa
+and dropped it into his vest pocket.
+
+The doctor--Dr. Braley--returned as the captain hung up the telephone
+receiver.
+
+"Miss Fulton is quieter now," he announced.
+
+"Doctor," requested Greenleaf, "look at this body, will you? What caused
+death?"
+
+Braley, a thin, quick-moving little man of thirty-five, bent over the
+dead woman, lifted one of her eyelids, and examined her throat as far as
+was possible without moving the head.
+
+"She was choked to death," he gave his opinion. "Although the eyes are
+closed, you see the effect they produce of almost starting from their
+sockets. And the tongue protrudes. Besides, there are the marks on her
+throat. You can see them there on the left side."
+
+"How long has she been dead?"
+
+"I can't say definitely. I should guess about eight or ten hours anyway."
+
+That staggered Greenleaf, the idea of this woman dead here in the front
+room of a bungalow on Manniston Road for eight or ten hours--and nobody
+knew anything about it! His agitation grew. He felt the need of doing
+something, starting something.
+
+"How about Miss Fulton?" he asked. "Can I get a statement from her?"
+
+"Not just yet. Give her a little more time to get herself together.
+Besides, she told me something about the--er--affair. Most remarkable
+statement--most remarkable."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"She says," related Braley, "that she only discovered the dead body of
+her sister a few minutes before she was heard crying for help. Her
+sister, Mrs. Withers, went to a dance, one of the regular Monday night
+dances at the inn--Maplewood Inn. She went with Mr. Campbell, Douglas
+Campbell, the real estate man here. You know him. They left the house at
+nine o'clock last night. That was the last time Miss Fulton saw Mrs.
+Withers alive.
+
+"In the meantime, Miss Fulton herself, who is under my orders to stay in
+bed all the time, was up and dressed so that she might spend the evening
+with a friend of hers from Washington. His name is Henry Morley. He left
+this house a little after eleven o'clock, and he left Furmville on the
+midnight train for Washington.
+
+"Miss Fulton, thoroughly tired out, went to bed and was asleep by
+half-past eleven. As she has something which she uses when she wants a
+good sleep, she took some of it last night and did not wake up until
+after ten this morning. She didn't even hear her sister come in last
+night.
+
+"When she awoke this morning, she called her sister. Amazed by receiving
+no answer, she got up to investigate. Mrs. Withers' bed had not been
+occupied. She then came in here and found the body."
+
+"You mean to say," put in Bristow, "that this sick girl was here all
+night and heard nothing?"
+
+"That's what she says," confirmed the physician.
+
+"Did she give any idea who the murderer might be?" queried Greenleaf.
+
+"No; she's not sufficiently clear in her mind to advance any theories
+yet--naturally."
+
+"Let me look around," suggested the captain.
+
+He did so, followed by Bristow and the doctor. Save for the overturned
+chair, between the sofa and the dining room door, the furniture, for the
+most part the mission stuff generally found in the furnished-for-rent
+cottages in Furmville, had not been knocked about in a struggle. That was
+evident. The two rugs on the floor had not been disturbed. None of the
+three men touched the overturned chair.
+
+All the windows of the living room and the dining room were closed but
+not locked, as there was on the outside of each the usual covering of
+mosquito wiring. The shades were down. The front door did not have the
+inside "catch" thrown on.
+
+Greenleaf examined the kitchen, the unoccupied bedroom, the bathroom, and
+the sleeping porch at the back of the house. This last, like the windows,
+was inclosed in stout wire screens, and nowhere, on either the windows or
+the sleeping porch, had this screening been broken. The kitchen door was
+locked. There was no sign of a struggle anywhere. These negative facts
+were gathered quickly.
+
+Mrs. Allen, summoned from the sister's side, reported that there were no
+signs of an entrance having been made through any of the three windows
+in the bedroom in which Miss Fulton now lay quiet.
+
+They made their way back to the living room. In spite of the most
+painstaking examination of the floor, walls, and furniture of the entire
+bungalow, they were, so far, without a clue. The murderer had left not
+the slightest trace of his identity or his manner of entrance to the
+death chamber.
+
+"As I see it," said the captain when they rejoined Jenkins, "nobody broke
+into this house last night. But two men had admission to it. They were
+Mr. Douglas Campbell, the real estate man, and Mr. Henry Morley, who was
+calling on Miss Fulton. It's up to those two to tell what they know."
+
+"But," objected the doctor, "Miss Fulton says Morley left town last
+night."
+
+"Humph! Maybe that makes it look all the worse for Morley."
+
+"But," suggested Bristow, "if we find that the front door was unlocked
+all night, the possibilities broaden."
+
+"How will we find that out?"
+
+"Miss Fulton might remember about it."
+
+"She did mention that," put in Braley; "it was unlocked."
+
+"All the same," insisted Greenleaf, "Morley's got to come back here.
+Wouldn't you say so?" This question was addressed to Bristow.
+
+The telephone bell rang in the dining room. The chief went to answer it.
+
+"What's that?" Those in the living room heard him. "You? I'm the chief of
+police. Where are you now? Oh, I see. Come up here, will you? There's
+been a murder here. Mrs. Withers. Right away? All right; I'll wait for
+you."
+
+He came back to the living room.
+
+"That was Mr. Henry Morley," he said, "Didn't leave town last night. What
+do you think of that?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+"SOMETHING BIG IN IT"
+
+
+Before the question was answered the coroner arrived. While Chief
+Greenleaf told him the circumstances confronting them, Dr. Braley
+telephoned for a trained nurse for Miss Fulton. In the absence of anybody
+else to perform the unpleasant task, the doctor went back to take up with
+the bereaved girl the matter of telegraphing to her family and the
+details of preparing the murdered woman's body for burial as soon as
+would be compatible with the plans of the coroner.
+
+"I wonder, Mr. Bristow," suggested Greenleaf, "if I couldn't walk up to
+your place with you and talk this thing over."
+
+"Glad to have you," agreed Bristow.
+
+The crowd on the porch and in the street began to disperse slowly after
+the chief had told them none of them could be admitted. In small groups,
+they made their way to porches or into houses where they lingered,
+speculating, wondering, advancing impossible theories.
+
+Why had death singled _her_ out? Who would ever have suspected that there
+had been in her life any foothold for tragedy? The secrecy with which she
+had been struck down, the ease of the murderer's coming and going safely,
+roused their resentment. They sympathized with themselves as well as with
+the dead woman.
+
+Confusedly, but at the same time with striking unanimity, they felt that
+this was not merely a mystery, but a mystery made ugly and shocking by
+base motives and despicable agents. In common with all mankind, they
+resented mystery. It emphasized their own dependence on chance. They
+began to guess at the best method for capturing the guilty.
+
+The chief of police and the lame man had reached the porch of No. 9.
+There Bristow picked up from a table a scrapbook and a bundle of
+newspaper clippings. Following him into the living room, Greenleaf
+brought a paste pot and a pair of shears which the other evidently had
+been using in placing the clippings in the big book. He put them down on
+a table in one corner near Bristow's typewriter.
+
+"Still figuring 'em out, I see," he said grimly.
+
+He referred to Bristow's habit of reading murder mysteries in the
+newspapers and working them out to satisfactory solutions. That was
+Bristow's way of amusing himself while set down in Furmville for the long
+struggle to overcome the tuberculosis with which he was afflicted. In
+fact, as a result of this recreation, he had become known to Greenleaf,
+who had visited him several times.
+
+He had rendered the captain considerable assistance in a minor case
+shortly after his arrival in the town, and Greenleaf was really amazed by
+the correctness of the lame man's solutions of most of the murder cases
+chronicled. He knew that Bristow had been right on an average of nine
+times out of ten, often clearing up the affairs on paper many days or
+even weeks ahead of the authorities in various parts of the country.
+
+Bristow had his records in his scrapbooks to prove his contentions. Under
+each clipping descriptive of a baffling murder he had written a brief
+outline of his solving of the case and dated it, following this with the
+date of the correct or incorrect solutions by the authorities.
+
+"But now," the chief added, as they sat down before the open fire, which
+earlier had fought against the chill of the cool May morning, "you can
+work one out right on the ground. And I'll be mighty glad to have your
+help--if you will help."
+
+"Of course," said Bristow. "I'll be more than glad to make any
+suggestions I can."
+
+The chief went out on the porch and called across the yard of No. 7 to
+one of his men on guard at No. 5:
+
+"Simpson, when a young man--name's Morley--gets there and asks for me,
+tell him to come up here to Number Nine."
+
+He came back and referred to Bristow's offer of help:
+
+"For instance?"
+
+"Well," Bristow answered, "as we see it now, there are three
+possibilities: Campbell, or Morley, or some unknown man or woman,
+coloured or white, bent on robbery."
+
+"So far, though, we haven't found any signs of robbery."
+
+"I have."
+
+"What were they?"
+
+"The middle, third and little fingers of Mrs. Withers' left hand were
+scratched, badly scratched, as if rings had been pulled from them by
+force. And there was a deep line on the back of her neck. It looked black
+just now, but it was red when it was inflicted. It was too thin to have
+been made by a finger, but it might have been caused by somebody's having
+tugged at a chain about her neck until it broke."
+
+"The thunder you say! I didn't notice any of that."
+
+"I'll show you the marks when we go back there."
+
+"But," objected Greenleaf, "I know Mr. Campbell. He's not the sort to
+steal. And I don't suppose Morley is."
+
+"They say the same thing about bank presidents," Bristow replied with a
+slight smile, "but some of them get caught at it, nevertheless."
+
+"Yes; but this is different--unless the murdered woman had extremely
+valuable jewelry."
+
+"That's true. Besides, if the front door was unlocked all night, or, even
+if somebody knocked at the door and Mrs. Withers answered it, there is
+your third possibility, any ordinary robbery and murder."
+
+"I believe that's what will come out," Greenleaf said, his troubled face
+showing his worried consciousness of inability to handle the situation;
+"but how will we--how will I prove it?"
+
+"Morley and Campbell can make their own statements."
+
+Bristow, going to the dining room door, called toward the kitchen:
+
+"Mattie!"
+
+Replying to his summons, a middle-aged coloured woman appeared.
+
+"Mattie, didn't I hear Perry tell you yesterday that he was to go to work
+this morning for Mrs. Withers, 'making' her garden?"
+
+"Yas, suh," answered Mattie, still breathing heavily from her hurried
+return from No. 5.
+
+"Has he been around this morning?"
+
+"Naw, suh."
+
+"Do you know where Mrs. Withers' servant lives?"
+
+"Yas, suh."
+
+"What's her name?"
+
+"Lucy Thomas, suh."
+
+"Well, I want you to go there right away and find out what's the matter
+with her, why she didn't show up for work this morning. Take your time.
+Dinner can wait."
+
+When Mattie had gone, Bristow explained:
+
+"This Perry--Perry Carpenter--is a young negro who does odd jobs in this
+section. He's about twenty-five, I guess. Each of these bungalows has a
+garden back of it, you know. There are no houses behind us. I don't like
+Perry's looks. He did some gardening for me Saturday and yesterday."
+
+"You think he----?"
+
+"He's got a bad face. If neither Campbell nor Morley killed Mrs. Withers,
+why shouldn't we find out where Perry and the servant woman of Number
+Five are now, and where they were all last night?"
+
+"I reckon that's right," chimed in Greenleaf. "It looks something like a
+common darky job at that."
+
+"And this," added Bristow, taking something from his vest pocket and
+handing it to the chief of police, "looks more like it, doesn't it?"
+
+Greenleaf examined the object the other had put into his hand. It was a
+metal button of the kind ordinarily worn on overall jumpers, and clinging
+to it were a few fragments of the dark blue stuff of which overalls are
+commonly made. On the back of the button were stamped in white the words:
+"National Overalls Company."
+
+"Where did you get this?" asked the chief.
+
+"I picked it up in the room where the dead girl was; and I'd forgotten it
+until this minute. It was on the floor a few yards from the body. You saw
+me when I picked it up. You were at the telephone."
+
+"That's right. I remember now. By cracky! That came off of some darky's
+working clothes. That's sure!"
+
+"The only trouble is," puzzled Bristow, "your negro doesn't wear overalls
+at night after he has finished work. He dresses up and loafs down town."
+
+"That's true on Saturday nights. Other nights they don't take the trouble
+to change. And last night was Monday night. No, sir! That's our first
+clue, that button; the first sign we've had of the murderer."
+
+"Keep it," Bristow told him. "I'm not as confident as you are, but you
+might have a look at the blouse of Perry's suit of overalls. We can't
+over-look anything now."
+
+Deep in thought he gazed at the fire. Greenleaf got up and walked to the
+window, which gave a magnificent view of the great Carolina mountains in
+the distance. He was not admiring the mountains, however. He was
+wondering why Mr. Morley had not arrived.
+
+"By the way," he said, "can't I get a drink of water?"
+
+He was in the dining room on his way to the kitchen before Bristow roused
+himself from his reverie.
+
+"Wait!" he called to the chief. "Let me get it for you."
+
+Greenleaf, however, had gone into the kitchen. Bristow followed him and
+took a tumbler from a rack on the wall.
+
+The chief drew the tumbler full twice from the faucet and gulped down the
+water. His hand shook. He was very nervous.
+
+As they turned to leave the kitchen, he uttered an exclamation and,
+stooping down swiftly, pulled something from under the stove. When he
+straightened up, he had in his hand another metal button. He turned it
+about in his fingers, studying it.
+
+"It looks like the one you found in Number Five," he said.
+
+They compared the two. They were identical. The two men stared at each
+other.
+
+"What do you make of that?" asked Greenleaf.
+
+"I was wondering," Bristow replied, thinking quickly, "when--how that got
+there." He paused and added: "Mattie doesn't wear overalls."
+
+They returned to the living room.
+
+"But," he continued, "Perry was working for me yesterday. He was in the
+kitchen talking to Mattie. I wonder--Well, there's one thing; if Perry's
+blouse has two buttons missing, he'll be confronted with the job of
+establishing an alibi for all of last night."
+
+"By cracky!" The captain slapped his hands together in evident relief.
+"I believe we've got him! I'm going to send a man after him."
+
+He went out to the porch and signalled another of his men.
+
+"Drake," he said, "I want you to find a young negro--name's Perry
+Carpenter--about twenty-five years old. He does odd jobs around here. Any
+of these other niggers can tell you where he lives. When you find him,
+take him to headquarters. Keep him there until I come. Get him. Don't
+lose him!"
+
+When he stepped back into the house, Bristow was regarding him with a
+smile.
+
+"I hope you're right," he told the chief, "but I've a hunch you're wrong.
+I believe this murder is more than an ordinary robbery by a darky.
+Somehow, I have the impression that there's something big mixed up in
+it."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I can't say exactly. Perhaps it's because I've been thinking of the
+beauty of the victim. Or it may be that I was impressed by what the women
+said about her when we were waiting for you on the porch."
+
+He thought a while, and decided that he had no explanation of why he
+had made the remark. He had not meant to say it. It had come from him
+spontaneously, like an endorsement of what all Manniston Road was saying
+at that very moment: the "the something big in it" loomed up, intangible
+but demanding notice.
+
+Greenleaf himself, for all his apparent certainty about the guilt of the
+negro Perry, sensed vaguely the possibility, the hint, that this crime
+was even worse than it appeared to be. But he would not admit it. He
+preferred to keep before his mind the easier answer to the puzzle.
+
+"No," he contradicted Bristow; "I believe Perry's the fellow we want.
+Here we are dealing with facts, not story-book romances."
+
+Just then a young man sprang up the steps of No. 9 and knocked on the
+door. It was Henry Morley, come to give weight to Bristow's "hunch."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE RUBY RING
+
+
+Although it was Chief Greenleaf who opened the door, it was to Bristow
+that Morley turned, as if he instinctively recognized the superiority of
+the lame man's personality. Greenleaf, of average height and weight, had
+nothing of command or domination about him. With his red, weatherbeaten
+face and mild, expressionless blue eyes, he looked like a well-to-do
+farmer. He was suggestive of no acquaintance with Tarde, Lombroso or any
+other authorities on crime and criminals.
+
+"Won't you sit down?" invited Bristow.
+
+The new-comer was tall and slender. In spite of a straight, high-bridged
+nose and thin lips, his face indicated weakness. His dark-gray eyes had
+in them either a great deal of worry or undisguised fear. As he took the
+chair pointed out to him, he was being catalogued by Bristow as showing
+too much uncertainty, even a womanish timidity. Bristow noticed also that
+his thick, soft blond hair was carefully parted and brushed, and that his
+fingers were much manicured.
+
+He breathed in short, quick gasps.
+
+"What is it? How--how did it happen?" he asked, his gaze still on
+Bristow.
+
+Greenleaf took a seat so that Morley sat between him and Bristow.
+
+"We don't know how it happened," said the chief. "We wanted to know if
+you could tell us anything."
+
+"I didn't see Mrs. Withers late last night," Morley replied, a nervous
+tremor in his voice.
+
+"Nobody said you did," commented Bristow.
+
+"No; I know that," Morley agreed in a queer, high voice.
+
+"But you were in the house, Number Five, last evening, weren't you?"
+Bristow inquired.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, tell us about it."
+
+"I came down here from Washington Saturday," the young man began. "I
+didn't come to see Mrs. Withers. I came to see Miss Fulton, her sister.
+Of course, I've seen Mrs. Withers since I've been here; I saw her early
+last night. You see, last night she went up to the Maplewood Inn for the
+dinner dance, and, when I called, she was just leaving with a Mr.
+Campbell. Miss Fulton and I sat on the front porch and in the parlour
+talking until a little after eleven."
+
+"We understood," put in Bristow, "that Miss Fulton was confined to her
+bed."
+
+"She was, that is--er--she was supposed to be; but she got up last
+evening and dressed to receive me."
+
+"I beg your pardon," again interrupted his questioner, "but everything is
+important here now, and we need information. We have so little of it as
+yet. I really apologize, but may I ask what your relations with Miss
+Fulton are?"
+
+Morley hesitated a full minute before he answered.
+
+"If it is to go no further than you gentlemen," he began.
+
+"Of course," the other two agreed.
+
+"Well, then, Miss Fulton and I are engaged to be married."
+
+"Ah! Go ahead." This from the lame man.
+
+"As I said, we talked until a little after eleven. Then I had to leave to
+catch the midnight train back to Washington."
+
+"But you didn't catch it."
+
+"No. You see, I was stopping at the Maplewood. That's more than a mile
+from Manniston Road, and it's fully two miles from the railroad station.
+Somehow, I didn't allow myself enough time, and I missed the train by a
+bare two minutes."
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"What did I do then?"
+
+"Yes--what then?"
+
+"I didn't go back to Maplewood Inn. I took a room for the night at the
+Brevord Hotel. It's near the station, you know, and I intended to catch
+the midday train today. Besides, it was late, and I didn't want to take
+the trouble of walking back or getting a machine to take me back to
+Maplewood."
+
+He drew out his handkerchief and mopped his forehead, which, as a matter
+of fact, was perfectly dry. He was tremendously unstrung. Bristow
+realized this and saw that now, more than at any subsequent time, he
+would be able to make the young man talk.
+
+"That," he said easily, "accounts for you, doesn't it? Now, I'll tell
+you. Chief Greenleaf and I are anxious to get some information about
+the Fulton family. As you know, we people here, being invalids, live
+pretty much to ourselves. We don't have the strength for much social
+life, and we don't know much about each other. What can you tell us?"
+
+"Miss Fulton and Mrs. Withers are--were sisters," Morley responded.
+"Their father, William T. Fulton, is a real estate man in Washington. By
+the way, Mar--Miss Fulton expects him here this afternoon. She told me so
+yesterday. Last fall, just before Miss Fulton was taken sick with
+tuberculosis, he failed, failed for a very large amount of money."
+
+"He was wealthy then?"
+
+"Yes; quite. Mrs. Withers was twenty-five. She married Withers, George S.
+Withers, of Atlanta, Georgia, when she was twenty-one. But, when Miss
+Fulton had to come here for her health, Mrs. Withers agreed to come, too,
+and look after her. Withers isn't wealthy. He's a lawyer in Atlanta, but
+he hasn't a big income."
+
+"How old is Miss Fulton?" asked Bristow.
+
+"Twenty-three."
+
+"Do you know whether Mrs. Withers had any valuable jewelry--rings, stuff
+of that kind?"
+
+Morley was for a moment visibly disturbed.
+
+"Why, yes," he answered after a little pause. "When Mr. Fulton failed,
+Miss Fulton gave up all her jewels, everything, to help meet his debts.
+Mrs. Withers refused to do this--at least, she didn't do it."
+
+Both Bristow and Greenleaf caught the note of criticism in his voice.
+
+"Just what was the feeling between the two sisters?" pursued Bristow.
+
+Again Morley paused.
+
+"Oh, all right, if you don't feel like discussing that," his interrogator
+said smoothly. "It's of no consequence. We'll find out about it
+elsewhere."
+
+"I suppose I might as well," said Morley. "It really doesn't amount to
+anything much. There has been considerable coolness between the two
+women."
+
+"Even when Mrs. Withers was here nursing Miss Fulton?"
+
+"Yes. You see, Mrs. Withers was and always has been Mr. Fulton's
+favourite. Miss Maria Fulton felt this, and she knew that Mrs. Withers
+came here only because Mr. Fulton asked her to do it. Also, Miss Fulton
+never forgave Mrs. Withers for not coming forward with her jewels, jewels
+which her father had given her--for not coming forward with them when he
+failed."
+
+"Did they ever quarrel?"
+
+"Well, yes. Sometimes, I think, they did. You know how it is with two
+women, particularly sisters, who are on what might be called bad terms.
+Then, as I was about to say, Mrs. Withers wasn't making any sacrifice by
+being here with her sister. Mr. Fulton, in spite of his reduced means,
+paid her expenses, all of them. Besides, Mrs. Withers had quite a good
+time here, going to the dances, and so on."
+
+"Do you know, Mr. Morley, whether they had a quarrel yesterday?"
+
+"They didn't so far as I know."
+
+"Miss Fulton said nothing to you about a quarrel?"
+
+"No."
+
+Bristow was silent a few seconds.
+
+"I think that's all, Mr. Morley. We're much obliged to you. Isn't that
+all, chief?"
+
+"Yes, for the present," Greenleaf answered with a long breath, thankful
+the other had been there to do the questioning. "That seems to cover
+everything."
+
+"I wonder if I could see Miss Fulton," Morley said, rising.
+
+"If the doctor will allow it," Greenleaf told him. "You might go down
+there and see."
+
+Morley put his hand on the doorknob.
+
+"By the way," interjected Bristow once more, and this time his voice was
+cold, steely; "Mr. Morley, did you wear rubbers last night?"
+
+"Rubbers?" parroted Morley.
+
+"Yes--rubbers."
+
+Morley stared a moment, as if calculating something.
+
+"Why, yes; I believe I did," he said finally.
+
+Greenleaf, glancing down at Morley's feet, noticed what Bristow had seen
+three seconds after Morley had entered the room--his feet were large,
+abnormally large for a man of his build. He must have worn a number ten
+or, perhaps, a number eleven shoe.
+
+"I thought so," Bristow observed carelessly. "I sleep out on my sleeping
+porch at the back of the house here, and I knew it rained hard from early
+in the night until seven this morning."
+
+Morley, without commenting on this, looked at the two men.
+
+"Is there anything more?" he inquired.
+
+"No, nothing more; thanks," said Bristow.
+
+The young man went out quickly, slamming the door in his haste.
+
+Bristow answered Greenleaf's questioning look:
+
+"There was no use in our looking round the outside of the house for
+possible footprints this morning. If there had been any, the rain would
+have cleared them away. But, when I first ran up on the porch--it's
+roofed, like mine here--I noticed the dried marks made by a wet shoe
+hours before, a large shoe, by a large shoe with a rubber sole, or
+by a rubber shoe."
+
+"The devil you did!"
+
+"I did.--But it may turn out that Perry, or somebody else, or several
+other people, wore rubber shoes, or rubber-soled shoes last night.
+Negroes always have large feet."
+
+"Well, I hope my man's found this Perry nigger," said the chief. "He's
+the fellow we want."
+
+"And yet," ruminated Bristow, "what young Morley said is interesting
+enough--two quarreling sisters living together--one decked in jewels, the
+other deprived of them--the jewels gone this morning." He smiled and
+waved his hands comprehensively. "As long as it _is_ a mystery, let's
+have it a real mystery. Let's look at all sides of it. There's Perry.
+There's Morley. And--there's Miss Maria Fulton."
+
+"Miss Fulton!"
+
+"Yes--a possibility."
+
+"Oh, I don't connect her up with it any." The chief's voice was tinged
+with ridicule.
+
+Bristow answered a knock on the door and opened to admit a uniformed
+policeman.
+
+"Beg your pardon, chief," said the officer, "but I had something for a
+Mr. Morley. The men on guard down there at Number Five wouldn't let me
+in to see him--said I'd better see you."
+
+"What have you got, Avery?" asked Greenleaf.
+
+"It's a little package. You know, I'm on that beat down there. Takes in
+the Brevord Hotel. The clerk said this Mr. Morley had sent his grips to
+the station, but had said he was coming up to Number Five, Manniston
+Road. He said there had been a murder up here. The clerk said he didn't
+know what to do with this property but turn it over to the police. As
+soon as I saw what it was, I hurried up here."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It's a ring, sir."
+
+"A ring!" exclaimed Bristow. "Let's see it."
+
+Policeman Avery handed Bristow a tissue paper package.
+
+The lame man unwound the paper and discovered a woman's ring, the setting
+a tremendous pigeon's-blood ruby flanked on each side by a diamond. It
+was an exceedingly handsome and very valuable piece of jewelry.
+
+"Where did the clerk get this?" Bristow asked swiftly.
+
+For the first time, he was visibly excited.
+
+"A maid found it under the bed on the floor of Mr. Morley's room at the
+Brevord," answered Avery.
+
+Greenleaf needed no hint from Bristow this time.
+
+"Avery," he said, "your beat takes in the railroad station. Go down to
+Number Five and get a good look at this man Morley. After that, if he
+attempts to leave Furmville, arrest him."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+TWO TRAILS
+
+
+"I'm afraid," said Bristow, after the policeman had hurried out, "we made
+a mistake in permitting Morley to talk to Miss Fulton just at present."
+
+"I can go down there and interrupt them," Greenleaf volunteered.
+
+The lame man reflected, a forefinger against the right side of his nose,
+the attitude emphasizing the fact that this feature was perceptibly
+crooked, bent toward the left.
+
+"No," he concluded. "We'd probably be too late." Then he added, "And we
+didn't find out Morley's employment or profession in Washington--but
+we can do that later."
+
+The chief of police prepared to leave, saying he was going to call at
+Douglas Campbell's office and from there go to headquarters in the hope
+that Perry had been found.
+
+"Can't you come with me?" he invited.
+
+"It's against the doctor's orders," Bristow replied. "He tells me not to
+leave this house or its porches. If I started to run around with you, I'd
+be exhausted in an hour. But I'll tell you what: this afternoon, after
+you've talked to Campbell and the darky, suppose you come back here, and
+we'll drop down to interview Miss Fulton ourselves."
+
+This surprised Greenleaf.
+
+"You mean you suspect----"
+
+Bristow laughed.
+
+"Oh," he countered lightly, "we've enough suspecting to do already.
+There's Perry--and there's Morley. Don't let's complicate it too much.
+But what Miss Fulton has to say may be valuable. By the way, if I should
+need to do so, how can I persuade anybody that I have authority to ask
+questions, or to do anything else in this matter?"
+
+The captain thought a moment.
+
+"I'll appoint you to the plain-clothes squad. I appoint you now, and the
+city commissioners will confirm it. They meet tonight. You're on the
+force--at a nominal salary--say ten dollars a week. That suit you?"
+
+"Perfectly," consented Bristow. "What I want is the power to help in case
+I have the opportunity."
+
+Greenleaf went out to the porch, followed by Bristow, and started down
+the steps.
+
+"By the way," his new employee said in a cautious tone, "don't forget to
+stop at Number Five and look for those scratches, on the fingers and the
+neck."
+
+"By cracky!" exclaimed the chief. "I'd forgotten all about it. I'll do
+that right away."
+
+Looking toward No. 5, Bristow saw a hearse-like wagon drawing up in front
+of the door. The coroner had already made arrangements for the removal of
+the body of Mrs. Withers to an undertaking establishment.
+
+The lame man went slowly into the house and stood at the window, staring
+at the mountains. In the clear, newly washed air, they looked like the
+soft, tumbling waves of some magically blue sea.
+
+Like most retiring, secluded men, he had his vanity in pronounced degree.
+He saw himself now, the dominant figure in this city of thirty thousand
+people, the man who had been selected by the chief of police as the one
+able to unravel the web of mystery surrounding this startling murder. The
+thought pleased him, and he smiled. He began to think about himself and
+about life as a general proposition.
+
+Everything was always so mixed up, so involved. People talked of a divine
+providence, of the law that virtue is rewarded, of the rule that to do
+good is to have good done to one. He smiled again. If all that was true,
+what explanation was there for the murder of this woman, this beauty
+whose good nature, kindness, and cleverness had endeared her to all with
+whom she came in contact?
+
+He had heard the women on the porch of No. 5 say that everybody had loved
+her. Why, then, had some ignorant negro or some white man bent on robbery
+been permitted to steal up on her in the dead of night and crush out her
+life? Was there any reason, any logic, any mercy in that?
+
+He drummed on the window-pane with his fingertips and whistled, scarcely
+audibly, a fragment of tune. His pursed up mouth made it clear that he
+was not a handsome man--the lower lip was heavy, somewhat protuberant.
+
+Pshaw! There was only one rule of life that held good, so far as he had
+been able to see. Strength and persistence accomplished things and
+brought success and security. Weakness and foolish prating about
+righteousness and virtue were never worth a dollar.
+
+That was it! If you were mighty and clever, you stayed on top. If you
+were sentimental and looking after other people's interests, you went
+down. You had no time to bother about the safety and happiness of others.
+Look out for yourself. Never relent in the fierce battle against the odds
+of life. That was the only way to conquer and avoid catastrophe.
+
+He was sure of it when he thought about himself. He had a brilliant
+brain. It was not particularly egotistic for him to think that. It was
+merely a fact. But he had not used it relentlessly and incessantly.
+He had relaxed his hold too often when seeking pleasure. Although he had
+done things which had been applauded by his friends, he had nothing much
+to show in the way of lasting results.
+
+That was why he was here now, with scarcely enough resources to pay the
+rent of his bungalow and the expenses of living. A little dabbling in
+real estate, some third-rate work for the magazines, a passing notoriety
+as a guesser of crime riddles--it was not a record that promised a bright
+future.
+
+He sighed. Well, that was the way of life. He might yet accomplish big
+things although he was under a terrific handicap--and he might not. He
+would try, and see.
+
+His future was much like the probable outcome of this murder. How
+would the circumstances shape themselves? What would be the result of
+circumstantial evidence?
+
+It was all a gamble. Some murderers were lucky and got away. And some
+innocent men were not lucky. These were like the blundering, illiterate
+negro Perry. There was an even chance that the guilty man would be
+caught--and there was an even chance that an innocent man would hang.
+Life was like that!
+
+He caressed with his forefinger his protruding lip. He wouldn't say the
+negro was guilty. In spite of the evidence of the buttons, he would
+advance no such theory yet. And as to Morley--nobody could think that
+a man with such a weak face would have the nerve to do murder. He knew
+this. There must be somebody else. It might be that the sister, Maria
+Fulton, in an excess of rage--But why reason about that before he had
+talked to her?
+
+It was up to him to fasten the guilt on the guilty man--or woman. That
+was what was expected of him. And it was a task which----
+
+He turned toward the table and began methodically to paste into their
+proper places the clippings he had cut from the newspapers concerning
+other "big" murder cases. He would study them later.
+
+He looked up and saw a very fat man standing just outside the door.
+
+"Hello, Overton," he said, without cordiality, and joined him on the
+porch.
+
+"I picked out an interesting time to visit you," observed the fat man,
+still puffing from the exertion of climbing the Manniston Road hill;
+"what with murder and----"
+
+"And I'm going to be frank with you," Bristow put in. "I'm helping the
+police a little, and I haven't the time to gossip now. I know you'll
+understand----"
+
+"Surely, surely!" said Overton. "I'll come some other time. This sort
+of stuff's right in your line. You used to be an authority on it in
+Cincinnati, I remember."
+
+He said good-bye and lumbered awkwardly down the steps. He and Bristow
+had been good friends in Cincinnati, and he seemed now not at all
+offended by the summary dismissal.
+
+The door leading from the kitchen to the dining room opened. Mattie had
+returned. Bristow reentered the house.
+
+"Well?" he said in the low, kindly tone he used in speaking to her.
+
+"I foun' Lucy Thomas, Mistuh Bristow," she said, breathless and
+indignant. "She is sho' one sorry nigger. She wuz drunk--layin' out in de
+parluh uv dat little house uv her'n. Dead drunk."
+
+"Did you wake her up, Mattie?"
+
+"Yas, suh; but she ain' fit to come do no wuk. Dis ole rotten blockade
+whisky dese niggers drink jes' knocked her out--knocked her out fuh
+fair."
+
+"Did she say when she got drunk?"
+
+"Las' night, suh, late, wid dat Perry. You know, Mistuh Bristow; he been
+doin' some wuk fuh you."
+
+"Was Perry drunk last night? Did she tell you?"
+
+"He wuz a little lit up, she says, but he warn't drunk. She didn't have
+no idea whar he wuz jes' now."
+
+Bristow made no comment on this, and Mattie, turning slowly away from
+him, began to mumble something.
+
+"What's that, Mattie?" he asked, only half curious.
+
+"I wuz jes' sayin', Mistuh Bristow, it 'pears to me marveelyus how some
+uv dese niggers behave. Dey don' look arter de white folks dey wuk fuh.
+Seems to me marveelyus how a lot uv dem keeps out uv jail."
+
+He was curious enough now.
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked sharply. "What are you talking about?"
+
+"It's jes' dis, suh: when I gits ovuh to Lucy's house, de fus' thing I
+sees is a key layin' on de flo'. When I ast her 'bout it, she says it
+mus' be de key to Number Five--she mus' uv drapped it."
+
+"I see," said Bristow thoughtfully. "Yes, you're right, Mattie. There are
+a lot of careless people in the world."
+
+When she had gone back to the kitchen, the full force of what she had
+said struck him. How simple it would have been for Perry to have taken
+the key from the drunken Lucy and gone to No. 5! After the commission of
+the crime, what would have been easier than for him to throw the key on
+the floor in Lucy's house, thus apparently proving that he had had no way
+of gaining entrance to the bungalow?
+
+"I didn't foresee this," he meditated. "There's only one thing more
+needed to hang that darky. That is the discovery that he has in his
+possession, or has hidden, the jewelry."
+
+He seemed suddenly reminded of something else by this thought. He went to
+the telephone and called up the Brevord Hotel.
+
+"A Mr. Morley, Mr. Henry Morley, registered there last night, didn't he?"
+he inquired of the clerk.
+
+"Yes," the clerk replied.
+
+"I wonder," continued Bristow suavely, "if you'd mind looking at the
+register and telling me exactly at what time he did register. This is
+Chief Greenleaf's office talking."
+
+"I see. Yes, sir; very glad to. Just hold the wire a moment while I
+look."
+
+Bristow waited. The Brevord was scarcely four minutes' walk from the
+railroad station. Morley, having missed the midnight train by two
+minutes, should have registered at the hotel certainly not later than ten
+minutes past midnight.
+
+"I have it," came the clerk's voice. "Mr. Henry Morley, of Washington, D.
+C., registered here at five minutes past two this morning."
+
+Bristow was astonished, but his voice was uncoloured by surprise when he
+inquired:
+
+"Are you sure of that?"
+
+"Quite," said the clerk laconically. "We always put down opposite each
+guest's name the time of arrival and registering."
+
+"Thanks ever so much." Bristow hung up the receiver slowly.
+
+It was now after one o'clock, and, following the routine prescribed by
+his doctor, he made his way to the sleeping porch to lie down for half an
+hour before dinner, his midday meal.
+
+"From midnight until two o'clock this morning," he reflected, revolving a
+dozen different facts in his mind. "Mr. Morley failed to mention how he
+amused himself during all that time. If he's not a criminal, he's
+criminally stupid."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE HUSBAND'S STORY
+
+
+Mr. Bristow, however, was not allowed to rest half an hour. Instead, he
+was called upon to consider a phase of the Withers murder more amazing
+than any of those so far uncovered. Barely ten minutes after his
+conversation with the clerk of the Brevord, Mattie announced that two
+gentlemen were waiting to see him, one of them being the chief of police.
+
+When Bristow stepped into the living room, Greenleaf introduced the
+stranger. He was Mr. Withers--Mr. George S. Withers, husband of the
+murdered woman. He was of the extreme brunette type, his hair
+blue-black, his black eyes keen and piercing and always on the move.
+Bristow got the impression in looking at him that all his features,
+the aquiline nose, the firm, compressed mouth, the large ears, were
+remarkably sharp-cut.
+
+The man's excitement was almost beyond his control. He apparently made no
+attempt to hide the fact that his hands trembled like leaves in the wind
+and that, every now and then, his legs quivered perceptibly. As soon as
+he had shaken hands, he sank into a chair.
+
+"Mr. Withers," the chief explained, "caught me at Number Five before I
+had started down town. I have explained how you are helping me in
+this--er distressing matter. So we came up here."
+
+"I see," said Bristow, betraying no surprise that Withers had appeared so
+suddenly.
+
+In fact, he had not thought of the husband previously, except to
+calculate that, in answer to the telegram Dr. Braley had undoubtedly
+sent, he could not reach Furmville from Atlanta before far into the
+night.
+
+"He only heard of the tragedy half an hour ago," Greenleaf added.
+
+"I didn't know you were in town or even expected," Bristow said casually.
+"I thought you were in Atlanta."
+
+"I--I wasn't expected." Withers hurried his words.
+
+"You mean nobody expected you?"
+
+"That's it, I wasn't expected. But I've been in--in town here since
+yesterday morning."
+
+"And Mrs. Withers didn't know of it?"
+
+"Nobody knew of it. I didn't want anybody to know of it."
+
+Bristow purposely remained silent, awaiting some explanation. He looked
+down, studying the pattern of the scratches he made by rubbing his right
+shoe against the side of the built-up sole, two inches thick, of his left
+shoe. The shortness of his crippled leg made this heavy sole necessary;
+and the awkwardness of it worried him. He seemed always conscious of it.
+
+Greenleaf, taking his cue from Bristow, said nothing.
+
+"I came in without notifying anybody," Withers felt himself obliged to
+continue, "and I registered under an assumed name."
+
+"Where?" the lame man asked swiftly.
+
+"At the Brevord."
+
+"What name--under what name?"
+
+"Waring, Charles B. Waring."
+
+"And you've been in Furmville since yesterday morning? Got here on the
+eight o'clock train yesterday morning?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Bristow gave him the benefit of another long pause and studied him more
+closely. He saw that this bereaved husband was of the high-strung,
+Southern-gentleman type, hot-tempered, impulsive, one of those apt to
+believe that "shooting" is the remedy for one's personal ills or
+injuries. The lines of his mouth betrayed selfishness and peevishness.
+
+The interrogator broke the silence at last:
+
+"Of course, Mr. Withers, there's some good explanation
+for your secret trip to Furmville?"
+
+"Well--er--yes."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+Withers hesitated.
+
+"I--I don't know that I care to say now--to discuss it yet."
+
+Bristow shot Greenleaf a prompting glance.
+
+"You see, it's this way," the chief acted on the silent suggestion; "I'm
+in charge of this matter, the capture of the murderer, and Mr. Bristow is
+helping me. In fact, he's the man in command. His abilities fit him for
+the work. If the man who killed your wife is caught, it will be through
+the work of Mr. Bristow. I'm confident of that. Moreover, every minute we
+lose now may be disastrous to us. Consequently, we want to hear your
+story. You appreciate our position, I know."
+
+Withers licked his dry lips with the tip of his dry tongue.
+
+"How about the newspapers?" he asked.
+
+"You'll be talking only for our information," cut in Bristow crisply. "We
+won't give it to the papers. We want to use it for our own benefit."
+
+"Ah, I see. Well, then----"
+
+Withers got up and paced the length of the floor several times in silence
+while they watched him. He gave the impression of framing up in advance
+in his mind what he would say. He seemed to want to talk without talking
+too much--to tell a part of a story, not all.
+
+"I tell you, gentlemen," he said, going back to his chair, his voice
+trembling, "this is a hard thing to get to. I mean I don't like to say
+what I must say. But I see there's no way out but this. The truth of the
+matter is, I came up here to satisfy myself as to what my wife was doing
+in regard to a certain matter."
+
+"You mean you were suspicious of her--jealous of her?" Bristow
+interpolated.
+
+"No, not that," returned the husband.
+
+"He's lying!" was the thought of both Greenleaf and Bristow.
+
+"No. Let me make that very clear. I never doubted her in that way."
+
+"Well, how did you doubt her?"
+
+Withers winced.
+
+"I don't mean I doubted her at all. I mean I thought she was being
+imposed upon financially. In fact, I was sure of it. I'm sure of it now."
+
+"You mean blackmail?" Bristow narrowed down the inquiry.
+
+"Just that. And I'll tell you about it." He rasped his dry lips again.
+"This sort of thing, this blackmail, had happened to her twice before
+this. Once it was when she was at Atlantic City for a month with her
+sister, Miss Maria Fulton.
+
+"That was a year after our marriage. Then, two years later--just about a
+year ago now--when she was in Washington visiting her father and sister.
+Both those times things happened as they had begun to happen here, in
+fact as they've been happening here for the past two months."
+
+"Well," Bristow urged him on, "what happened?"
+
+"She got away with too much money, more money than she could possibly
+have used for herself in any legitimate way. First, she got her father to
+give her all she could get out of him. Her second step would be to write
+to me for all I could spare, making flimsy excuses for her need of it.
+
+"Her third resource was to pawn all her jewels. She pawned them on these
+first two occasions I've described. I say she pawned them, but I never
+had definite proof of it. However, I was sure of it. I don't know that
+she had come to this in Furmville. If she hadn't she would have."
+
+"What were Mrs. Withers' jewels worth?"
+
+"Originally, I should say, they cost about fifteen thousand dollars. She
+had no difficulty, I suppose, in raising six or seven thousand dollars on
+them--even more than that."
+
+"They were worth so much as all that?"
+
+"Yes. Her father had given her most of them before his business failure.
+He failed last fall, I forgot to mention."
+
+"Now," Bristow said persuasively, "about this blackmailing proposition.
+What was--what is your idea about that?"
+
+Withers produced and lit a cigarette, handling it with quivering fingers.
+
+"Somebody, some man, had a hold of some sort on her. Whenever he needed
+money, had to have money, he got it from her. That is, he did this
+whenever he could find her away from home. So far as I know, he never
+tried to operate in Atlanta."
+
+"What do you think this hold was?"
+
+"Well," Withers began, and paused.
+
+"Your theories are perfectly safe with us," Bristow reassured him.
+
+"I thought, naturally, that it had something to do with her life previous
+to the time I met her."
+
+"How?"
+
+"I didn't know. That's what worried me." All of a sudden, his hearers got
+a clear idea of what the man had suffered. It was plainly to be detected
+in his voice. "It might have been a harmless love affair, a flirtation,
+with letters involved, letters which she thought would distress me if I
+ever saw them."
+
+"Nothing more than that?"
+
+"I never thought she had been guilty of anything--well, immoral,
+heinous."
+
+"You say," Bristow changed the course of questioning, "she pawned her
+jewels twice. How did she do that? Where did she get the money to redeem
+them after the first pawning?"
+
+"I don't know. I never could find out."
+
+"You had no six or seven thousand dollars to give her for that purpose,
+as I understand it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Where did she get it, then?" Bristow's questions, despite their
+directness, were free from offense.
+
+"I--I thought," Withers began again and paused. "I thought that, perhaps,
+her father helped her out, got the jewels out of pawn both times for
+her."
+
+"Did you ever ask him?"
+
+"Yes; and he denied having done so. But, you see, my theory is borne out.
+Before, when she pawned them, her father was wealthy; and she was his
+favourite child. She knew he would help her. But now his money is gone.
+He's failed. Consequently, she has not pawned them this time. She knew
+there would be no chance to redeem them."
+
+Bristow leaned forward in his chair.
+
+"Mr. Withers," he asked, "as a matter of fact, did you ever know that
+your wife had pawned her jewels?"
+
+"Well," he said, as if making an admission, "she would never confess it
+to me. I assumed it from the fact that on both occasions the jewels were
+missing for a good while. They were certainly not in her possession. She
+couldn't produce them when called upon to do so."
+
+"I see. Now, Mr. Withers, what did you do yesterday, all day yesterday,
+after reaching here?"
+
+"I went to the Brevord and registered under the name of Waring. After I
+had had breakfast, I went straight to Abrahamson's pawnshop. It's the
+only pawnshop in town. I told him I was looking for some stolen jewelry
+and I expected that an attempt might be made to pawn it with him. He
+agreed to let me wait there, well concealed by the heavy hangings at the
+back of his shop. I spent the day there except for a few minutes in the
+afternoon when I went out for a quick lunch."
+
+"Yes? Did you find out anything?"
+
+Once more Withers found it hard to speak.
+
+"Yes"; he said finally. "A man came in and pawned one of my wife's rings.
+It had a setting of three diamonds. It was worth about seven hundred and
+fifty dollars, I should say. Abrahamson let him have only a hundred on
+it."
+
+"Why only a hundred?"
+
+"I had asked him to do that, so as to prove that the man was a thief--you
+know, willing to take anything offered to him."
+
+"And he did take the hundred?"
+
+"He did."
+
+"What happened after that?"
+
+"I followed him from the shop--for half a block. When he had gone that
+distance, I lost him. He stepped into a store, and I waited for him to
+come out. He never did. It was the old dodge. The store extended the
+width of a block. He made his escape through the other entrance."
+
+Greenleaf was more excited even than Withers.
+
+"This man," the chief put in; "what did he look like?"
+
+"He was of average weight, medium height. He had a gold tooth, the upper
+left bicuspid gold. His nose was aquiline. He wore a long, dark gray
+raincoat, and he had a cap with its long visor pulled well over his face.
+Then, too, he wore a beard, chestnut-brown in colour. That's about the
+best description I can give you of him. You see, this happened late in
+the afternoon."
+
+"All right," Bristow kept to the main thread of the story. "Now, about
+last night. What then?"
+
+Withers threw away his cigarette and sighed.
+
+"I came up here and watched Number Five. I had an idea that this fellow
+might show up."
+
+"Did he?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Where did you watch from?"
+
+"Most of the time I sat on the steps of Number Four, almost directly
+across the road from Number Five. You know how it is on this street.
+Nearly everybody is in the back of the house after dark. The invalids are
+on the sleeping porches behind the houses. Besides, it was in deep shadow
+where I was. I was not observed when my--when Mrs. Withers left the house
+with an escort, a man, early in the evening."
+
+"And you waited until she returned?"
+
+"Yes; I waited."
+
+"Very well." There was for the first time a hint of sharpness in
+Bristow's voice. "You waited. What did you see?"
+
+For the past few minutes a change had been taking place in the bearing of
+Withers. It was as if, having recovered slightly from the terrific shock
+of his wife's death, he was gradually stiffening, gaining the strength
+necessary to withstand the swift volley of Bristow's questions.
+
+The questioner, sensing this alteration in the other, made his queries
+all the quicker and more peremptory. He wanted to profit as much as
+possible from the other's lack of control.
+
+"I saw her return with her escort," Withers answered. "She shook hands
+with him and went into the house and closed the door. He got into his
+machine, turned it and went back toward town."
+
+"Was his machine noisy?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did you try to enter Number Five?"
+
+"No. I wasn't ready to disclose my presence. I wanted more time."
+
+He put his hand to his watch pocket and was surprised to find that no
+watch was there; he had been making nervous little movements like that
+throughout the interview; but he kept his keen glance on his questioner.
+
+"Then, tell us this, please," Bristow demanded, the sharpness in his tone
+pronounced: "have you and your wife been on the best of terms lately?
+And another thing: have you ever had any lasting, distressing
+disagreements with her?"
+
+The effect of this upon Withers was entirely surprising. He sprang from
+his chair, his features suddenly working with rage.
+
+"Dammit!" he exclaimed in a tense, vibrant voice, as his glance rested
+first on Bristow and then on Greenleaf. "What does all this amount to
+anyway? Here you are, asking me questions as if you thought I had killed
+my own wife! What I want is results, not a lot of hot air and bluff!"
+
+He snapped his fingers under Bristow's nose.
+
+"Why, dammit!" he shrilled. "Haven't you any idea yet where to look for
+the murderer? Are you groping around here helplessly after all this time?
+Dammit! I want a real detective on this job, and I'm going to get one."
+
+He clapped his felt hat to his head and started toward the door.
+
+"You can bet your last dollar on that! I'm going to get one, and he'll be
+here tomorrow if telegrams can bring him. I'll have Sam Braceway, the
+cleverest fellow in this business in the South, here tomorrow! I intend
+to have punishment for the devil who killed my wife. Punishment!--the
+worst kind!"
+
+His lips were trembling, and he dashed the back of his hand across his
+face, as if he feared the formation of tears in his eyes.
+
+"You two boneheads can put that in your pipes and smoke it! I mean
+business!"
+
+He slammed the door, and was gone, taking the steps to the street in two
+bounds.
+
+"By cracky!" said Greenleaf. "What do you make of that?"
+
+"Nothing," Bristow answered contemptuously; "nothing except that it may
+be well for us to find out a whole lot more about Mr. Withers and his
+peculiarities of temper and temperament."
+
+"I should say so," the chief chimed agreement.
+
+"Of course," Bristow added, "that was the easiest way for him to break
+off our inquiry. I don't think he was on the level with all that storming
+and raging. It might have been just a great big bluff--that's all. And
+yet, that Braceway he talked about is good, a wonder. He's done some
+wonderful work."
+
+"Here's one point," Greenleaf advanced: "why didn't he ask for help from
+the police yesterday afternoon when he lost track of that fellow with the
+gold tooth?"
+
+"Yes," the other returned absent-mindedly; "why didn't he?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+MORLEY IS IN A HURRY
+
+
+Bristow looked at his watch. It was nearly half-past two o'clock.
+
+"Hear anything about Perry?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," Greenleaf informed him. "My man found him. They've got him down at
+headquarters. I phoned from Number Five and got this. He'd been drinking.
+I gather that he's about half-drunk now."
+
+"Good! If he'll talk at all, it will be easier for you to get the truth
+out of him that way than if he were cold sober. Suppose you see him and
+Douglas Campbell; and later on this afternoon you and I can talk to Miss
+Fulton and her father."
+
+"Her father won't be here today. He wired that a little while ago. He'll
+get here early in the morning."
+
+"Very well. It's of no consequence just now. Come back here for me at
+four, will you?"
+
+When the chief had gone, Bristow sat down to his delayed dinner. As he
+ate, he went over the facts so far discovered, and catalogued them:
+
+Perry, the negro--incriminated, probably, by the buttons from his
+overalls jacket; by the ease with which he could have obtained from Lucy
+Thomas the kitchen key to No. 5; by the possible motive of robbery; and
+by the brutal means, choking, employed to inflict death.
+
+Morley--incriminated by his unknown whereabouts during the two hours
+following his missing the midnight train, and by the discovery of the
+ring (possibly Mrs. Withers') in his room at the Brevord.
+
+Withers--involved by the probable motive of jealousy and rage, and by his
+secret trip to Furmville.
+
+Maria Fulton--well, he would see.
+
+"Just now," he concluded in his own mind, "it looks worse for the negro
+than anybody else. There's one thing certain: the man against whom the
+most evidence rests by the time they have the inquest tomorrow will be
+the one held for the action of the grand jury. That's the thing to
+do--get the one who seems most probably guilty."
+
+He thought of Douglas Campbell and immediately dismissed him as a
+possibility in the list of probable murderers. The young real estate
+dealer had been completely exonerated by the statement of the dead
+woman's husband; that, upon bringing her back to the bungalow, he had at
+once said good night to her and gone home.
+
+Nor did he puzzle his mind about the unknown individual with the gold
+tooth, he who had appeared in Abrahamson's pawnshop and a few minutes
+later miraculously disappeared. If the ring pawned had belonged to Mrs.
+Withers, why should this man return to No. 5 and murder her? If he had
+obtained nothing from her beforehand, he might have had a real motive for
+the crime. But, since he had already got the ring, it seemed folly to
+assume that he would later kill her.
+
+In spite of his growing belief that the onus of proof must fall upon the
+negro, Bristow could not keep his thoughts away from young Morley. He,
+more than any of the other suspects, had told an unsatisfactory story.
+Besides, he had a bad face.
+
+The latest addition to the Furmville plain-clothes squad remembered how
+carefully Morley's hands had been manicured. He----
+
+With a quick motion, he went to the telephone and called for Greenleaf.
+
+"Chief, are you still holding Perry?"
+
+"Sure, I'm holding him. I'll continue to hold him for some time, I'm
+thinking. His story don't suit me. He says----"
+
+"All right. Ill get that from you when I see you this afternoon. In the
+meantime, I wish you'd have his finger nails carefully cleaned. I
+want----"
+
+But the request had instantly overwhelmed Greenleaf.
+
+"What!" he yelled. "Clean his finger nails!"
+
+"Yes," Bristow continued smoothly, disregarding the other's evident
+distaste and surprise. "If I were down there, I'd do it myself. In fact,
+it would be better for you to do it. Don't leave it to some careless
+subordinate."
+
+The chief laughed his sarcasm.
+
+"You know," this still with laughter, "we Southerners are none too strong
+on acting as manicures to these coloured folks."
+
+"It's absolutely necessary," was the insistent answer. "And, when you do
+clean them, save every bit of dirt thus obtained. Now, will you do it?"
+
+"Why, yes," Greenleaf assented with reluctance. "If you say it's
+absolutely necessary, I'll do it--I'll do it myself."
+
+"Good. I'll depend on you for it. By the way, can't you have somebody,
+your man Jenkins or some one as good as he is, go out on a real hunt for
+the fellow with the gold tooth? You remember Withers' description of
+him?"
+
+"Yes. I'd thought of that."
+
+"That's good. If he can't spot him at any of the hotels, have him make
+the rounds of the boarding houses. I think you'd like to get your hands
+on a customer as slippery as Withers says that man is."
+
+"I'll send Jenkins at once," the chief took his directions in good part.
+
+"Good again. By the way, you'll be up here at four?"
+
+"No; five. Dr. Braley told me we'd have to wait until then; said we'd
+better. He wants her to get that extra hour's sleep."
+
+Bristow started to say something further, hesitated and then hung up the
+receiver with a word of assent.
+
+Mattie had come in to clear off the table.
+
+"Go down to Number Six," he told her, "and ask Mrs. Allen if she will be
+so kind as to come up here at her earliest convenience. Explain to her
+that it's against the doctor's orders for me to leave this house, and
+that the excitement of this morning has tired me out."
+
+Mrs. Allen appeared in less than a quarter of an hour. He received her in
+the living room and introduced himself, apologizing for not having been
+able to call on her. She understood perfectly, she said.
+
+She was a woman about forty years of age, her face a little thin and
+worn, a good deal of gray in her dark hair. She had been nursing her
+husband for two years, and the strain had begun to tell. Nevertheless,
+he soon saw that she was a woman of refinement, possessed of a keen
+intelligence.
+
+"I wish," he requested, after he had explained his connection with the
+murder, "you'd tell me all you know about these sisters. I gathered this
+morning that you were well acquainted with them."
+
+He had always found it easy to gain the confidence of women. They liked
+his manners, his air of deference, his manifest interest in everything
+they said.
+
+"I can't say that I've been intimate with them," Mrs. Allen explained in
+her soft, pleasing voice; "but Mrs. Withers and I knew each other pretty
+well. She came over to my house quite frequently, and I was in the habit
+of running in to see her."
+
+"Don't you know the other, Miss Fulton, equally well?"
+
+"No. You see, she was always in, or on, the bed, and she never seemed to
+want to talk. Besides, she was different from Mrs. Withers--not so bright
+and attractive, and not so neighbourly."
+
+"Mrs. Withers was always a laughing, sparkling sort of a person, wasn't
+she?"
+
+"She gave that impression to some people," Mrs. Allen answered
+thoughtfully, "but not to me. It was her nature to be free and happy.
+Most of the time she seemed that way. But there were other times when
+I could see that she had something weighing on her mind, something
+depressing her."
+
+"Ah!" Bristow said with deeper interest. "That's just what we want to
+find out about."
+
+Mrs. Allen sat silent for a moment pursing her lips.
+
+Bristow let her reflect.
+
+"I don't think," she said at last, "Mrs. Withers ever was in fear of
+anybody or any thing. She wasn't that kind."
+
+"Did she ever tell you anything to make you think that she wasn't happy?"
+
+"I was trying to recall just what it was. Once, I remember, when she was
+sitting out on the sleeping porch--she sometimes came out there to talk
+to my husband, who is always in bed--we had been discussing the care with
+which every woman had to live her life.
+
+"'Women are like politicians,' Mr. Allen said. 'They can't afford to have
+a dark spot in their past. If they do, somebody will drag it out.'
+
+"At that Mrs. Withers cried out:
+
+"'Oh! how awfully true that is! And how unfair! It never seems to matter
+with men, but with women it means heaven, or the other thing. I wish
+I knew----' She broke off with a gasp, and I saw her lip tremble.
+
+"It was funny, but at the time I thought she was referring to her sister,
+not to herself."
+
+"What made you think that?"
+
+"I don't know. I had no real reason for it. Perhaps it was just because
+unhappiness seemed so foreign to Mrs. Withers herself."
+
+"Was there anything else?"
+
+"Once, when I ran into Number Five, I found her crying. She was in the
+living room, all doubled up in a rocking chair, crying silently."
+
+"Did she say why?"
+
+"No; but, while I was trying to soothe her, she said, 'Life's so
+hard--it's so hard to straighten out a tangle when once you've made it.
+If one could just go back and do things over again!' When I asked her if
+I could help her, she said I couldn't. 'Nobody can,' she sobbed out on my
+shoulder. 'It doesn't concern me alone. I'll have to fight it out the
+best way I can.'"
+
+Bristow was greatly interested.
+
+"What did you conclude from all that, Mrs. Allen?" he asked.
+
+"My impression was very vague," Mrs. Allen returned frankly. "I don't
+think it is of much value now. I got, somehow, the idea that there was in
+her life something which she had to conceal, something which might at any
+moment be discovered. I thought she was worrying about its effect on her
+husband. Of course, though, that was just my idea."
+
+"I see. Now, just one other thing: what did you think, what do you think,
+of Miss Fulton?"
+
+"Oh, merely that she's bad-tempered and impatient, always complaining.
+She was totally without any appreciation of all that Mrs. Withers did
+for her. Nobody likes Miss Fulton particularly. I think all of us, as we
+came to know the two, were amazed that Mrs. Withers could have such a
+disagreeable sister."
+
+Mrs. Allen's recital, while interesting and valuable as to Mrs. Withers'
+acknowledgment that she felt compelled to keep secret some part of her
+life, threw no practical light on the situation.
+
+Bristow was silent, thoughtful, for a few moments.
+
+"I've never seen Miss Fulton, except for the glance I had at her this
+morning," he said. "Was it possible for anybody to mistake one for the
+other? I mean this: if a man had known that last night Miss Fulton was up
+and dressed, could it have been possible for him, in a dim light and
+under the stress of terrific agitation, to have attacked Mrs. Withers
+under the impression that he was attacking Miss Fulton?"
+
+"Oh, no!" Mrs. Allen said emphatically, and then added: "Oh, I see what
+you mean. Well, they were of about the same build, although Mrs. Withers
+wasn't so thin as Miss Fulton is. Then, their hair is different, Mrs.
+Withers' black, Miss Fulton's blond. I don't know. I should say it all
+depended on how dark it was."
+
+When Mrs. Allen had gone, Bristow took from a bookcase one of his
+scrapbooks and went to work pasting into place the clippings he had been
+reading that morning when interrupted by the cry of murder.
+
+For nine years he had been studying murder cases and the methods of
+murderers. People had laughed at his fad, but now he was more pleased
+with himself as a result of it than ever before. He was still pleasantly
+aware of the prominence he would enjoy in Furmville because of
+Greenleaf's having called on him for assistance.
+
+"Every murderer," he had said many times, "makes some mistake, big or
+little, which will lead to his destruction if the authorities have brains
+enough to find it."
+
+He thought the rule might apply too widely to this case. In fact, his own
+trouble now was that too many mistakes had been made, too many clues had
+been left lying around. In order to determine the guilty person, much
+chaff would have to be sifted from the wheat of truth.
+
+He was closing his scrapbook when the chief of police arrived a few
+minutes before five o'clock.
+
+"Henry Morley," Greenleaf announced at once, "is a receiving teller in a
+bank in Washington--the Anderson National Bank."
+
+"And receiving tellers," put in Bristow quickly, "sometimes need
+money--need it to make good other money they have 'borrowed' from the
+bank. How did you find this out?"
+
+"He told me when I met him at Number Five after leaving you this
+afternoon."
+
+"Was he still there then?"
+
+"Yes. It seems that Miss Fulton refused at first to see him. When she did
+see him, it was for only a minute or two. He was very much agitated when
+he came from her room."
+
+"There's another thing," added Bristow. "Morley has two hours of last
+night to account for. He told us he missed the midnight train and went to
+the Brevord to spend the night. As a matter of fact, he registered at the
+Brevord a little after two o'clock this morning."
+
+The chief's jaw dropped.
+
+"How do you know that?"
+
+"I called up the Brevord and got the information from the clerk."
+
+"That settles it, then," Greenleaf said, his jaw set. "That young man
+will have to remain with us for a while."
+
+"Yes; quite properly."
+
+"I guess it's time for us to move." The chief turned toward the door.
+
+"One moment," said the other. "Somehow, I have the impression that we may
+get important stuff from Maria Fulton. She may not give it to us directly
+and willingly, but we may get it all the same. And I was thinking this:
+you and I have got to keep our heads. We don't want to get rattled with
+the idea that we're up against an unsolvable mystery.
+
+"As you know, I've lived in New York and Chicago and Cincinnati. For the
+past eight or nine years I've gotten a lot of fun out of watching and
+studying these cases. And the thing I've learned above all others is that
+the best way for a criminal to escape is for the authorities to lose
+their heads and think they are up against something that's really much
+bigger than it is.
+
+"You see what I mean? What we want to do is to go ahead with our eyes
+open, knowing that at any moment we may stumble against the one act that
+will make everything clear and definite."
+
+"That's good talk, and I'll try to act on it," replied the chief, "but,
+gee whiz! I'm not used to stuff of this sort. It kinder makes me sick."
+
+They went out to the porch.
+
+"By the way," Bristow asked, "what about the two buttons we found?"
+
+"They belonged to Perry," Greenleaf answered. "There's no getting around
+that. He had the two middle buttons of his overalls jacket missing.
+What's more, one of the buttons, the one that had a little piece of the
+cloth clinging to it, fitted exactly into the hole made in the jacket
+when the button was pulled out."
+
+"Which button was that?"
+
+"The first one--the one you found in Number Five."
+
+They started down the steps.
+
+"You saw the scratches on Mrs. Withers' hand, didn't you?" said Bristow.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, if Perry did the scratching, we can prove it. Any good laboratory
+man can tell us whether the stuff that was under his nails contains
+particles of the human skin, the epidermis. If those particles are found,
+the case is settled, it seems to me."
+
+"By cracky!" exclaimed Greenleaf, his admiration of his assistant
+growing. "You've solved the problem--gone to the very bottom of it."
+
+"What did Perry have to say? What was his story?"
+
+"Oh, it amounted to nothing. Said he wasn't near Number Five; said he was
+drunk last night and thought he was at the house of this Lucy Thomas all
+the time."
+
+"Then, the proof rests upon what the laboratory analysis of the finger
+nail stuff shows. When can we get that report?"
+
+Bristow was a little surprised by the embarrassment Greenleaf showed
+before answering:
+
+"We can get it tomorrow--by wire."
+
+"Why can't we get it tonight--or tomorrow at the latest? The Davis
+laboratory here can do the work. It does laboratory work for all these
+doctors here."
+
+"It can't do any work for me," objected Greenleaf stubbornly. "Dr. Davis
+and I aren't on speaking terms, personally or politically. I'll send the
+stuff down to a laboratory at Charlotte. It will reach there tomorrow
+morning if I get it off on the midnight train. We can get the telegraphed
+report on it late tomorrow or the day after."
+
+"All right; I guess that will do," agreed Bristow.
+
+As they started up the steps to the Fulton bungalow, Morley came out to
+the porch and charged down toward them. His face was convulsed as if by
+anger or fear. He did not seem to see the two men. Bristow caught him by
+the arm and put the query:
+
+"Where are you going, Mr. Morley?"
+
+Morley shook off his hand and answered curtly:
+
+"To Washington. I've barely got time to catch my train."
+
+"Don't hurry," Bristow said with a touch of sarcasm. "You're too good at
+missing trains anyway. Besides, we want to know what you did between
+midnight and two-ten this morning, and why you failed to tell us this
+morning that you didn't register at the Brevord until after two."
+
+Morley's face went white.
+
+"There wasn't anything to that," he explained. "I didn't mean to conceal
+anything. I didn't go anywhere--anywhere specially."
+
+"Where did you go?" insisted Bristow.
+
+"I took a walk. That was all. I didn't feel like sleeping."
+
+"Did you see anybody while you were walking?"
+
+"Not that I remember. Why?"
+
+"Because, if you did, it might be advisable for you to remember. It may
+become necessary for you to prove an alibi."
+
+"Oh, that!" the young man said with a nervous laugh.
+
+"Yes. Can't you tell us where you went?"
+
+"I wandered around, up and down the down-town streets. That was all."
+
+"Well, remember," Bristow cautioned him. "If you can produce two or three
+people who saw you down there, it may help you a whole lot."
+
+"Oh, that's all right, I haven't done anything against the law. The
+idea's absurd."
+
+"Mr. Bristow's right," Greenleaf put in. "We'll have to know more about
+how you spent those two hours. Really, we will. If you try to leave town,
+you'll be arrested. My men have their orders."
+
+Greenleaf had forgotten about the ring found in the young man's hotel
+room, but Bristow hadn't.
+
+Morley went slowly down Manniston Road. There was a cold moisture upon
+his forehead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+MISS FULTON IS HYSTERICAL
+
+
+The chief and his assistant were received by Miss Kelly, the trained
+nurse. Bristow wasted no time in what he considered to be the crucial
+search for more evidence. In speaking to her he exercised all his
+persuasiveness, all the suggestion of power and authority that he could
+force into his voice and expression. And yet, he gave her, as he had
+given Mrs. Allen, the impression that he deferred to her and prized her
+opinions.
+
+"Isn't there something you can tell us?" he asked, holding her glance
+with his own.
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+She was a strong, capable-looking woman of twenty-six years or so.
+
+"Like every good citizen," he answered smoothly, "you want exactly what
+we want, a clearing up of all this muddle. I thought, perhaps, there
+might be something you'd heard or seen. Isn't there?"
+
+"No; nothing, sir," she returned, true to her professional teaching that
+a nurse is forbidden to reveal the secrets of the sickroom.
+
+"You'll be called as a witness at the inquest," he hazarded, and was
+rewarded by a look of uncertainty in her eyes. "Your duty to the law is
+above everything else," he added.
+
+"I've heard Miss Fulton say only one thing," she admitted reluctantly.
+"She's said it several times while under the influence of the sedatives
+she's had."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"Nothing that made any sense. It was, 'When he--say--I--asleep.' There
+were long pauses between each of the words. She said it four or five
+times. But she hasn't said anything since she waked up."
+
+"How long has she been awake?"
+
+"About fifteen minutes. Mr. Morley saw her five minutes ago, but he
+wasn't in there more than a minute or two."
+
+"Morley's seen her a second time!"
+
+"Yes; but each time she hasn't wanted to talk to him. The truth is, she
+drove him out of the room."
+
+"You didn't hear what they said?"
+
+Miss Kelly drew herself up indignantly.
+
+"I wasn't in the room," she said coldly. "Of course, I didn't hear."
+
+Bristow apologized for the implication that she had overheard
+intentionally.
+
+When he and Greenleaf were shown into Miss Fulton's room, he had made up
+his mind in lightning-like manner that what she had said in her delirium,
+meant: "When he (her father or the police) asks me about last night, I
+shall say I was asleep all night." It came to him like an intuition,
+without his even trying to reason it out; and he decided to act on it.
+
+They found Maria Fulton propped up against pillows in the bed. Although
+her pupils were still enlarged by the sedatives she had had, she was
+plainly labouring under the stress of great emotion.
+
+Bristow was pleased by that. It would make it easier to learn what she
+knew. It is difficult, he reflected, for a person under the partial
+effects of a drug to lie intelligently or convincingly.
+
+He and Greenleaf, taking the chairs that had been placed near the bed by
+Miss Kelly, regretted the necessity of their intrusion.
+
+"Oh, it's all right," Miss Fulton said petulantly. "I know it's
+essential. Dr. Braley told me so."
+
+Bristow studied her intently. He saw that Mrs. Allen had been right.
+Maria Fulton was a dissatisfied, peevish woman. She had the heavy,
+slightly pendent lower lip that goes with much pouting. There was the
+constant trace of a frown between her eyebrows, and in the eyes
+themselves was the look of complaint and protest which the "martyr-type"
+woman always shows.
+
+She was of the infantile, spoiled class, he decided, one who, remembering
+that her childhood tears and fits of temper had always resulted in her
+getting what she wanted, had brought the habit into her adult years. He
+noted, too, that her gorgeous ash-blond hair had been carefully "done,"
+piled in high masses above her petulant face.
+
+"There are just a few questions which we thought it imperative to ask
+you," he said, trying to convey to her his desire to be as considerate as
+possible. "We shall make them as brief as we can."
+
+Miss Fulton plucked impatiently at the coverlet, but said nothing.
+
+Bristow, acting on his belief that life with this girl must always be
+more or less stormy, took a chance.
+
+"Now," he said, fixing his keen glance upon her, "about this quarrel you
+and your sister had yesterday?"
+
+She frowned and waved her right hand in careless dismissal of the
+subject.
+
+"Oh, that," she said, "didn't amount to anything."
+
+"What was it about?"
+
+"I really don't know. You see, my sister and I didn't get along very well
+together."
+
+Bristow put out his hand, and Greenleaf handed him the ring that had been
+found in Morley's room at the Brevord.
+
+"This ring," he said; "whose is it?"
+
+She sat up straight and gasped. Her pallor grew. Even her lips went
+thoroughly white.
+
+"Where did you get that?" she asked huskily.
+
+"It doesn't matter. Whose is it?"
+
+"It--it was my sister's," she said, almost in a whisper.
+
+"Do you know who gave it to Mr. Morley?"
+
+She stared, speechless, at Bristow.
+
+"Don't you know?" he persisted.
+
+"Yes," she said with obvious effort; "I--I lent it to him."
+
+"When?"
+
+"Yest--last night."
+
+"Why?"
+
+She tried to smile, but her features were moulded more nearly to a
+grimace.
+
+"Mr. Morley and I--and I--have been engaged," she laboured to explain.
+"He said he wanted to wear it for a while just because it belonged to
+me."
+
+"But he knew it didn't belong to you, didn't he?"
+
+"I suppose," she corrected herself, "he meant he wanted to wear it
+because I had worn it."
+
+"I see," commented Bristow, and added very quickly: "How much of your
+sister's jewelry is in this house now?"
+
+Miss Fulton stared at him again, and did not answer.
+
+"Can't you tell me?" he urged. "How much?"
+
+She turned her head from him and looked out of the window.
+
+"None of it," she replied finally. "I had Miss Kelly look for it. It's
+all--gone."
+
+"Why did you have Miss Kelly look for it? What made you suspect that it
+was gone?"
+
+She turned to him and frowned more deeply, angrily.
+
+"It was, I suppose," she said shortly, "the first and most natural
+suspicion for any one to have; that, since she had been killed, she had
+been robbed. It was the only motive of which I could think."
+
+"Yes," he agreed pleasantly, handing the ring back to the chief; "I think
+you're right there."
+
+He was silent for a full minute while the girl in the bed plucked at the
+coverlet and eyed first him and then Greenleaf.
+
+"Miss Fulton," he demanded more sharply than he had yet spoken, "did you
+see or hear anything last night in connection with this tragedy, the
+death of your sister?"
+
+"No; nothing," she answered, her voice now approaching firmness. It was a
+firmness, however, that was forced.
+
+"How do you explain that?"
+
+"I went to bed before my sister returned from the dinner dance, and I
+had taken something Dr. Braley had given me that breaks up the severe
+coughing attacks to which I am subject and that also puts me to sleep."
+
+"Makes you sleep soundly?"
+
+"Very."
+
+"It was a hypodermic injection, wasn't it?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you took it--administered it to yourself?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Do you know what it was?"
+
+"Yes; morphine."
+
+"A sixteenth of a grain, wasn't it? That's what is always given to
+tuberculars to prevent violent spells of coughing, isn't it?"
+
+She hesitated, but finally assented.
+
+"But that's very little to make one sleep so soundly, that one couldn't
+hear the cries of a woman being murdered and all the noises that must
+have accompanied the attack upon her. Don't you think so?"
+
+"But, you must remember," she said tartly, "I'm not accustomed to taking
+morphine. Anyway, that's the way it affected me."
+
+"You heard absolutely nothing and saw nothing until you discovered your
+sister's body at ten o'clock this morning?"
+
+"That's true. Yes; that's true." She looked out of the window, paying him
+no more attention.
+
+Bristow, in his turn, was silent. Greenleaf took up the inquiry:
+
+"Several times today, while you were asleep or delirious, you said the
+words: 'When he--say--I--asleep,' Can you explain that for us, Miss
+Fulton?"
+
+Her pallor deepened. This time terror flourished in her eyes as she
+turned sharply toward Greenleaf.
+
+"Who says I said that?" she demanded, husky again.
+
+"Things are heard pretty easily in these bungalows," he said. "One of my
+men heard it."
+
+"Oh, I understand," she replied, a hint of craftiness creeping into her
+voice. "No; I can't explain it. One can't often explain one's ravings."
+
+"It merely suggested something that we had thought impossible," Bristow
+interjected soothingly: "that you might have wanted to deny having heard
+something which you really did hear; that you were protecting somebody."
+
+"Oh," she said angrily, "that's absurd--utterly."
+
+"Quite," lied Bristow suavely. "That was what I told Chief Greenleaf."
+Then, with sharp directness, he asked her: "Who do you think killed your
+sister?"
+
+"I don't know! Oh, I don't know!" she cried shrilly, more than ever
+suggestive of the spoiled child.
+
+"It must have been some burglar. She was very popular, everybody said.
+She had no enemies."
+
+"None at all?"
+
+"None that I know of."
+
+"But Mr. Morley didn't like her, did he?"
+
+"No," she said slowly. "He didn't like her, but you couldn't have called
+him her enemy."
+
+Bristow moved his chair toward her several inches.
+
+"Miss Fulton," he asked, "you and Mr. Morley are engaged to be married,
+aren't you?"
+
+"No!" she surprised him. "No; we're not!"
+
+He did not tell her that Morley had said they were.
+
+Greenleaf was now clearly conscious of what he had vaguely felt while
+listening to Bristow's questioning of Withers: the lame man had the
+faculty of seeming entirely inoffensive in his queries but at the same
+time putting into his voice an irritating, challenging quality which was
+bound to work on the feelings of the person to whom he talked. He had
+begun to have this effect on Miss Fulton.
+
+"I understood," he informed her, "that you were--er--quite fond of each
+other."
+
+"Not at all! Not at all!" she denied with increasing vehemence. "I'm not
+engaged to him now. Nothing could induce me to marry him!"
+
+"Mr. Morley declared this morning that you and he were to be married."
+
+She caught herself up quickly, anger evident in her eyes, and at the same
+time, also, a look of caution. Bristow decided she wanted to tell
+nothing, to give him no advantage, no actual insight into the clouded
+situation.
+
+"I see what you mean," she said. "We were engaged, but I finally decided
+that our marriage was impossible--because of this--my illness."
+
+"And you told him so?"
+
+She thought a long moment before she answered:
+
+"Yes."
+
+"When?"
+
+"Yesterday."
+
+"Then, when did you give him--let him have Mrs. Withers' ring?"
+
+She showed signs of weakening.
+
+"Yesterday," she declared. "No! Last night, I've already told you."
+
+"And why did he want the ring last night when you had broken with him
+earlier yesterday?"
+
+His subtle irritation of her by his manner and tone had unstrung her at
+last.
+
+"I don't know," she cried, hysterics in her voice. "Oh, I don't know! Why
+do you ask me all these foolish little questions?" She tore unconsciously
+at the counterpane, her fingers writhing against one another. "Please,
+please don't bother me any more! Leave me! Leave me now, won't you?"
+
+The high, shrill quality of her tone brought Miss Kelly into the room.
+
+"I think," the nurse said, "you gentlemen will have to put off further
+conversation with Miss Fulton--if you can. The doctor said she was not
+to be subjected to too much excitement."
+
+They already had risen.
+
+"We've very much obliged to you, Miss Fulton," Bristow said in his
+pseudo-pleasant way. "It may be useful to us to know about you and Mr.
+Mor----"
+
+He was interrupted by a cry from the girl. Without the slightest warning,
+she had lost the last shred of her self-control. She began to beat on the
+covering of her bed with clenched fists. He could see how her whole body
+moved and twisted.
+
+Greenleaf, startled by the girl's demeanour, moved further from her.
+Bristow stood his ground, watching her closely.
+
+She glared at him with the wild look that frequently comes to the
+hysterical or neurotic woman's eyes. She did not seem to be suffering.
+She was angry, carried away by her rage, and giving vent to it without
+any attempt at restraint!
+
+In two or three seconds she had become suggestive of an animal, her
+nostrils distended, the upper lip drawn back from her teeth. Bristow,
+going beyond surface indications, estimated her at her true worth: "Too
+much indulged; overshadowed, perhaps, by some older member of the family;
+but capable of big things, even charm. She's far from being a nonentity.
+She may help me yet."
+
+He regarded her calmly, and smiled.
+
+"Don't mention him to me again!" she screamed. "I won't have it! I won't
+have it, I tell you! I never want to see him again--never! Don't speak
+the name of Henry Morley in----"
+
+But Miss Kelly had quickly motioned them out and closed the door. Even on
+the outside, however, they could hear her shrill, whining protest against
+any mention of Morley.
+
+"Now!" said Greenleaf as they went through the living room. "What do you
+make of that?"
+
+They left the house and stood on the sidewalk outside.
+
+"Not much," Bristow replied, thinking deeply. "What with Withers throwing
+a fit, and then this girl having, or shamming, hysterics, it's
+disappointing. But here's a question: what has Morley done since last
+evening to make her hate him--at least, to make her look frightened when
+his name is mentioned to her?"
+
+"What do you think?"
+
+"I should say murder, or something just a little short of
+murder--wouldn't you?"
+
+Greenleaf looked his bewilderment.
+
+"No," he objected. "I don't believe she'd protect him if she knew he'd
+killed her sister."
+
+"Not if she knew, perhaps," Bristow pursued ruminatively. "But if she
+suspected, merely suspected?"
+
+The chief did not answer this. He was clinging now to the theory of
+Perry's guilt. It seemed to him the easiest one to prove.
+
+"By the way, Mr. Bristow," he suggested, "wouldn't it be a good idea for
+us to search the yard and garden back of this house?"
+
+"What for?"
+
+"There's always the chance that the murderer, in running away, dropped
+something, even a part of the plunder. Then, too, remember the buttons."
+
+"Yes; I see what you mean, but it's getting late now. The light's none
+too good--and I'm tired, chief, tired out. Suppose we let that go until
+tomorrow--or you do it alone."
+
+"No; I'll wait for you tomorrow. We can do it together."
+
+"Oh," Bristow asked, as if suddenly remembering an important item, "what
+kind of shoes is Perry wearing?"
+
+"An old pair of high-topped tennis shoes--black canvas."
+
+"Rubber soles?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I'm sorry," observed Bristow. "That's another complication. Morley wore
+rubbers last night. Either he or Perry might have made that footprint on
+the porch."
+
+"How about Withers?" Greenleaf advanced a new idea. "He didn't tell us
+anything he did after seeing Campbell leave here last night."
+
+"That's true. You'd better see him tonight. Ask him about that; and find
+out what time he returned to the Brevord. If you don't get it out of him
+tonight, you probably never will. By tomorrow, his detective, Braceway,
+will be on the scene, and the chances are that Withers will talk to him
+and not to us--that is, if he talks at all."
+
+"Then I'll see you in the morning?"
+
+"Yes; any time. I'll get up early. But, if you get anything out of
+Withers tonight, telephone me--or if your man Jenkins reports on his
+search for the fellow with the gold tooth."
+
+"O. K.," agreed the chief, and swung off down the hill.
+
+Bristow, whom he had left absorbed in thought, turned after a few minutes
+and went back to the door of No. 5. Miss Kelly answered his ring.
+
+"I'm sorry to disturb you," he said, his smile a compliment, "but there's
+something I'm very anxious for you to do for me. Will you clean Miss
+Fulton's finger nails as soon as you can? And I want you to keep
+everything you get as a result of that process."
+
+"Do her nails!" The nurse was amazed.
+
+"Yes; please. I'll explain later. And another thing: don't cut the
+cuticle. Don't bother with that at all. Just get what's under the nails.
+You'd better use merely an orange stick, I think. Will you do that for me
+carefully--very carefully? It's of the greatest importance."
+
+Miss Kelly finally said she would.
+
+He went back to his own porch and sat a long time watching the last,
+fading rays of the sunset.
+
+But he was not thinking about the landscape.
+
+"This man Withers," he was reflecting, "and his getting this detective,
+Braceway. Let me think. I mustn't look at these things in the light of my
+theories only. Too much theorizing is confusing.
+
+"I want to get the angle of the ordinary man in the street. How would it
+look to him? Why, this way: either Withers is on the level and wants
+to do everything possible to have the murderer caught--or he's smart
+enough to employ Braceway in the knowledge that neither Braceway nor
+anybody else can get anything from him that he doesn't want to tell--I
+wonder."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE BREATH OF SCANDAL
+
+
+A telegraph messenger laboured up to the hill on his bicycle and climbed
+the steps to the porch of No. 5, displaying in his hand several
+telegrams. Two other boys had preceded him within the last hour. Friends
+of the Fulton family, having read of the tragedy in afternoon papers
+throughout the country, were wiring their messages of sympathy.
+
+This was no little local, isolated affair, Bristow reflected. The
+prominence of the victim in Washington and in the South, together with
+the mystery surrounding the crime, made it a matter of national interest.
+If he could bring the thing to a successful issue, the capture and
+punishment of the right man, there would be fame in it for him. The
+thought stimulated him.
+
+A few minutes later Withers came up Manniston Road and went into No. 5.
+Soon after that Miss Kelly brought Bristow a little paper packet.
+
+"I'm not sure I ought to do this," she said, "but, as long as the
+authorities have ordered it, I guess I'm safe. This is what I get as a
+result of 'doing' Miss Fulton's nails."
+
+He thanked her and reassured her.
+
+Mattie appeared at the door to tell him his supper was ready. Before he
+sat down at the table, he telephoned Greenleaf.
+
+"There's something else I want you to send to Charlotte with the Perry
+package."
+
+"Same sort of thing?" inquired the chief.
+
+"Yes--Miss Fulton's."
+
+"Wow!" barked Greenleaf over the wire. "I never thought of that."
+
+"That's all right, I nearly forgot it myself. How will you send for it?"
+
+The chief thought a moment.
+
+"I'll come after it myself," he said. "I'll be up there as soon as I see
+Withers. I want to talk to you about the inquest. It will be held at
+eleven o'clock tomorrow morning."
+
+"Come ahead," Bristow invited. "You'll have to be up here in this
+neighbourhood anyway if you want to see Withers. He came up to Number
+Five just a few minutes ago. You can catch him there."
+
+After supper he went back to the front porch in time to see in the dusk
+the white uniform and cap of a trained nurse as she came down the hill.
+He surmised that she was one of the six nurses who lived in No. 7, the
+house between his and that of the murdered woman. These nurses were
+employed throughout the day at the big sanitarium located just over the
+brow of the hill at the end of Manniston Road.
+
+Perhaps, she could tell him what he wanted to know.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he called to her persuasively, "but may I trouble
+you to come up here for a moment?"
+
+She obeyed the summons with slow, hesitant steps.
+
+He pushed forward a chair for her and bowed.
+
+"Unfortunately," he apologized, "I don't know your name."
+
+She enlightened him: "Rutgers; Miss Emily Rutgers." In his turn, he told
+her briefly of his connection with the murder.
+
+"I was wondering," he began, "whether you had ever heard anything unusual
+from Number Five."
+
+Miss Rutgers, who was blond and too fat, had a heavy, peculiarly hoarse
+voice. She wanted to be certain that he had authority to "question
+people" about the case. He made that clear to her.
+
+"Well, yes," she finally said. "Mrs. Withers and Miss Fulton quarreled a
+good deal. We girls had remarked on it. And yesterday they had an awful
+row. I heard some of it because it was in the middle of the day, and I
+had run down here from the sanitarium to fix up the laundry we'd
+forgotten early in the morning."
+
+"What did you hear?"
+
+"It was something about money. I didn't really try to listen, but I
+couldn't help hearing some of it, they talked so loud."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"I got the idea that Miss Fulton wanted to borrow some money from Mrs.
+Withers for a purpose that Mrs. Withers didn't approve of. 'Well,' I
+heard Mrs. Withers say after Miss Fulton had almost screamed about it,
+'you can't have any more. I haven't got it. That's all there is to that.
+I can't let you have it when I haven't got it!'
+
+"Miss Fulton said something--I think it was about Mr. Withers or about
+asking him for the money.
+
+"'You'd better not do that,' Mrs. Withers warned her. 'I tried that once,
+and he flew into a perfect rage. He was so worked up that he looked like
+a crazy man, like a man who would do anything. He looked as if he might
+kill me, choke me to death, anything!'"
+
+"Did Miss Fulton answer that?"
+
+"If she did, I didn't hear it. I just got the impression that they were
+both angry and mixed up in a terrific quarrel."
+
+"Have you ever heard anything else like that at any other time?"
+
+"Oh, we often heard them fussing. Miss Fulton did the fussing. Mrs.
+Withers was almost always gentle and calm. One other time I did hear Mrs.
+Withers say she'd lent Miss Fulton all she could afford."
+
+"When was that?"
+
+"Some time ago--a month or six weeks ago; maybe two months."
+
+"Money, always money," the lame man said.
+
+He was silent, thoughtful, for several minutes.
+
+"I'm ever so much obliged, Miss Rutgers," he said at last. "Every bit of
+evidence we can get will help us--perhaps."
+
+Miss Rutgers had risen.
+
+"There's one other thing, Mr. Bristow," she volunteered. "There was a
+man hanging around Number Five last night; rather, it was early this
+morning."
+
+"How do you know that?" His voice was at once urgent.
+
+"Bessie--Miss Hardesty and I have our beds on the sleeping porch. Hers is
+the one nearest to Number Five. She told me about it this morning. At
+about one o'clock--or between one and two--she thought she heard a sloppy
+footstep near the sleeping porch. At that time it was raining, but
+not hard--just a fine drizzle.
+
+"She went to the wiring that walls the sleeping porch on the end toward
+Number Five, and she made out the figure of a man coming from the front
+of Number Five and going toward the back fence. He had just passed the
+sleeping porch. She turned on the little flashlight we keep out there and
+saw him."
+
+"Who was it? Could she make him out at all?"
+
+"She said it was a negro."
+
+"Did she see his face?"
+
+"Not enough to recognize him, but enough to make her sure he was a black
+man."
+
+"She didn't try to identify him?"
+
+"Well, she thought it was the darky Perry who does so much work in this
+neighbourhood. She said she thought so because the figure of the man she
+saw in the rain reminded her of Perry's general appearance."
+
+"Did she call out to him?"
+
+"No; and he didn't run. He just walked fast and was out of sight in a
+moment. When I heard of the murder early this afternoon, I was up at the
+sanitarium, and I went to the matron and told her what I've just told
+you. It was her advice that, as soon as I got off duty, I should come
+down here and telephone what I knew to the police. She didn't want me to
+do it from the sanitarium because the patients might have heard it and
+become too much excited."
+
+"I see. Where's Miss Hardesty now?"
+
+"This is her night on duty at the sanitarium."
+
+"I see. Well, she'll have to testify at the inquest tomorrow. You might
+tell her that. Never mind, though. The police will notify her."
+
+"I know she won't like that much," Miss Rutgers declared; "but, of
+course, she'll tell what she knows. How about me?"
+
+"I can't say yet, but I don't think we'll need you at the inquest. We may
+need you later."
+
+"Very well," she consented. "Let me know when the time comes. Good
+night, Mr. Bristow."
+
+He went inside and picked up a novel. He wanted to "clear his brain" for
+the talk with the chief of police.
+
+Greenleaf came in, looking downcast.
+
+"What did you get from Withers?" Bristow asked.
+
+"Nothing but a good bawling out," the chief said testily. "We won't get
+anything more from him for some time. He told me so. He said: 'You
+fellows have been carrying things with a high hand today, questioning and
+frightening everybody with your hidden threats and third degrees. Get
+out! I'll do my talking to Sam Braceway tomorrow.' But I did ask him one
+question--the thing you wanted to know. I asked him whether he had worn
+rubber shoes last night."
+
+"What did he say?" Bristow was inwardly amused by Greenleaf's
+pertinacity.
+
+"He said it was none of my business; and he flew into a rage about
+it--worse than he was in here this morning. He looked like a crazy man.
+I watched him gesticulate and get red in the face and foam and splutter.
+Why, he looked like a man who might commit murder any moment."
+
+At that, Bristow started. The chief's words were strikingly like what
+Miss Rutgers had told him she had heard Mrs. Withers say: "He looked as
+if he might kill me, choke me to death, anything!"
+
+"He's going to spend the night in Number Five," Greenleaf concluded; "he
+and Miss Fulton and the nurse, Miss Kelly."
+
+Bristow tossed his novel into a vacant chair and spread out his hands.
+
+"Well, chief," he said, "what do you make out of all this? What do you
+intend to do at the inquest tomorrow? By the way, here's something you'll
+need."
+
+He related what Miss Rutgers had told him.
+
+"I'm willing to take your advice," Greenleaf announced, "but this is my
+idea: we'll present all we have against Perry, and have him held for the
+grand jury. We've got enough to do that--the buttons evidence, his
+failure to present anything like an alibi, the mark of the rubber sole on
+the front porch, the inability of the woman, Lucy Thomas, to say whether
+or not she gave Perry the kitchen key to Number Five."
+
+"She can't remember that, can she?"
+
+"No; not even when we've got her locked up in jail."
+
+"Chief, do you think Perry killed and robbed Mrs. Withers?"
+
+"I think this," he replied: "it's an even chance he did. If he didn't,
+it's a sure thing that his being accused of it and locked up for it may
+make the real criminal more careless and give us a better chance to catch
+him."
+
+"Yes; you're right. What reports have you had on the mysterious man
+Withers says he saw, the fellow with the long-visored cap, long raincoat,
+and gold tooth?"
+
+"A little something. Jenkins has scoured the town pretty well in the time
+he had, A clerk at Maplewood Inn thinks--_thinks_--he saw such a man in
+the lobby there about three weeks ago. And one of our patrolmen, Ashurst,
+says he's pretty certain he saw him two months ago near here, in fact
+down on Freeman Avenue near where Manniston Road branches off from it. It
+was at night, nearly midnight."
+
+"Did Ashurst watch him?"
+
+"Only carelessly. Says he saw him walk on down Freeman Avenue as if he
+intended going into the town."
+
+"What did the clerk see? What did this fellow do in the Maplewood Inn
+lobby?"
+
+"Nothing--came in, bought a pack of cigarettes, and went out."
+
+"Anybody else seen him?"
+
+"Not so far as we've been able to discover."
+
+"Has he ever registered at any of the hotels here?"
+
+"Not that we can find; no, never."
+
+"Funny," ruminated Bristow, "very funny. Yes, I think you're right,
+chief. Put up the case against Perry until we can do something better
+or prove it on him absolutely. Of course, if the laboratory test shows
+that he had human flesh--a white person's flesh--under his finger nails,
+that will settle it in my mind. There couldn't be any other answer."
+
+"Will the test show whether it's a white person's skin or a nigger's?"
+
+"Of course. There's no pigment in a white person's skin."
+
+"Is that so? That's something I never knew before. Anyway, it certainly
+will nail him, won't it? But, you don't feel anyways sure Perry's the
+guilty man, do you?"
+
+"No, I can't say I do. I'll tell you what we've got to consider, and it's
+not a very pretty theory; either that Morley killed Mrs. Withers, and
+Miss Fulton knows it; or that Morley and Miss Fulton together killed her;
+or that, although Perry killed her, we, in looking for the murderer, have
+come pretty near to stumbling on some sort of a nasty family scandal,
+something in which Maria Fulton, Enid Withers and George Withers, with
+perhaps another man, all have been mixed up.
+
+"I mean a scandal ugly enough for all the rest of them to make desperate
+attempts to keep it hidden, even when Mrs. Withers is dead and gone.
+Frankly, I didn't believe Withers was in on the murder or that he
+believes Maria had anything to do with it or knows how it was done.
+
+"But Maria Fulton--that's different. How else are we to explain her
+behaviour with us when we tried to interview her, the fact of her sudden
+abhorrence for Morley, the man to whom she was engaged only yesterday?
+
+"And how else are we to explain Morley's unexplained two hours of last
+night, and his apparent terror today, and his whole connection with the
+case--the matter of the ring found in his hotel room, and all that?
+There's something fishy about this thing somehow, something fishy that
+includes Maria Fulton and Morley.
+
+"This fellow with the brown beard and the gold tooth strengthens the
+theory of some rotten scandal. He must be mixed up in it some way. I'll
+bet anything, though, that he had nothing to do with the murder. That's
+what we want to get at--this inside scandal, this something which existed
+long before the murder but yet may have led indirectly to the murder."
+
+Greenleaf sighed and passed his hand wearily across his eyes. He had had
+a hard day, the hardest day of his life.
+
+"But you think my plan for the inquest is all right?" he asked once more.
+
+"Yes; it's the best thing possible. By the way, don't have me summoned to
+testify. Leave my evidence until the trial. I don't want to wear myself
+out going down there for merely an inquest."
+
+"All right; I'll fix that. We've enough evidence without yours--enough
+for the inquest, anyway."
+
+"Thanks."
+
+Bristow looked at his watch, and Greenleaf got up to go.
+
+"I'll be up here between eight and nine tomorrow morning," he said, "if
+that suits you."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To get a good look at the grounds back of Number Five. If the murderer
+dropped anything, I want to be the man to pick it up."
+
+"Oh, I'd forgotten that," Bristow said in a tone indicating his
+hopelessness of finding anything worth while. "Yes; I'll be ready for
+you."
+
+Something else was on Greenleaf's mind.
+
+"This Braceway," he said sarcastically, "the smartest detective in the
+South. He'll be here in the morning. What will we do? Work with him?"
+
+"Sure," Bristow replied heartily, as if to fore-stall the other's dislike
+of the new-comer. "Even if he were no good, the best thing we could do
+would be to work with him. And, as he's something of a world-beater,
+we'll get the benefit of his ideas. By all means, let's all keep together
+on this thing."
+
+"All right," Greenleaf agreed, his tone a little surly. "Your appointment
+to my force is O. K. I fixed that this afternoon. Good night."
+
+"Good night--and don't forget to send that stuff off to the Charlotte
+laboratory tonight. If we can find out who scratched somebody last night,
+if we can determine who had little bits of foreign skin under the finger
+nails today, we've got the answer to this murder mystery. That's one
+thing sure."
+
+Bristow turned off the lights in the living room and went to his dressing
+room to prepare for bed on the sleeping porch.
+
+"Money," he was thinking as he undressed; "money and fifteen thousand
+dollars' worth of jewelry. Where has it all gone? That's the thing that
+will settle this case, and I think--I think I've a pretty good idea of
+what will be proved about it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+WOMEN'S NERVES
+
+
+Lucy Thomas in a cell in the Furmville jail sat on the edge of her cot
+at midnight, staring into inky darkness while she tried to remember
+the events of the night before. She was not of the slow-witted,
+stupid-looking type of negro women. The thing against which she struggled
+was not poverty of brain but the mist of forgetfulness with which the
+fumes of liquor had surrounded her.
+
+Questioned and requestioned by the police during the afternoon and early
+evening, she had been able to tell them only that she and Perry had been
+drinking together in her little two-room cabin. When he had left her,
+what he had said, whether he had returned--these points were as
+effectually covered up in her mind as if she had never had cognizance of
+them.
+
+She did remember, however, certain things which she had not imparted to
+the police. One was that at some time during the night there had been a
+struggle between herself and Perry. The other was that at some time,
+far into the night or very early in the morning, she had heard the
+clank-clank of the iron key falling on the floor of her house, a key
+which she had worn suspended on a ribbon round her neck.
+
+She rocked herself back and forth on the cot, her head throbbing, her
+mouth parched, tears in her eyes. To the white people, she thought, it
+did not matter much, but to her the fact that she and Perry had intended
+to get married was the biggest thing in her life.
+
+"I don't know; I don't know," her thoughts ran bitterly. "Ef Perry tuk
+dat key away fum me, he mus' done gawn to dat house--an' he wuz full uv
+likker. Ef he ain' done tuk dat key fum me an' den later flung it back on
+de flo' uv my house, who did do it?"
+
+She sobbed afresh.
+
+"He is one mean nigger when he gits too much likker in him. Ain' nobody
+knows dat better'n I does. An' he sayed somethin' las' night 'bout
+gittin' a whole lot uv money. He--"
+
+She moaned and flung herself backward on the cot.
+
+"Gawd have mussy! Gawd have mussy! I done remembuhed. I done remembuhed.
+He done say somethin' 'bout dat white woman's gol' an' jewelery. Gawd!
+Dat's whut he done. He done it! Dat's why he wuz fightin' me. He wuz
+tryin' to git dat kitchen key. An' he got it! He got it! Ef he done kilt
+dat woman, de white folks goin' to git him sho'ly--sho'ly. An' him an' me
+ain' nevuh gwine git married--nevuh. Dey'll kill him or dey'll sen' him
+to dat pen. Aw, my Gawd! My Gawd!"
+
+She sat up again and began to think about Mrs. Withers, how well the
+slain woman had treated her, how kindly. From that, her thoughts went to
+ghosts. She fell to trembling and moaning in an audible key. It was not
+long before a warden, awakened by her cries of terror, had to visit her
+and threaten bodily punishment if she did not keep quiet.
+
+After a while, she relapsed into her quiet sobbing.
+
+"I think maybe he done tuk dat key. I knows he done lef' me durin' de
+night, an' I b'lieve he done come back. But I ain't gwine say nothin'.
+Maybe I don' know. Maybe I is mistuk. De whole thing done got too mix' up
+fuh me. Maybe he kilt her an' maybe he ain' been nigh de place. But I
+wish I coul' know. My holy Lawd! I wish I done know all dat done happen.
+
+"Dat key fallin' on de flo'. Who done drap it dar ef Perry ain' drapped
+it? Dat's whut I'd like to know. Ef he ain' had dat key, ain' nobody
+had it."
+
+She lay down, weeping and sobbing from unhappiness and terror. Bristow
+and Greenleaf would have given much to have known her suspicions,
+suspicions which amounted to a moral certainty.
+
+On the sleeping porch of No. 5, Manniston Road, Maria Fulton lay awake a
+long time and tortured herself by reviewing again and again the thoughts
+that had crushed her during the day. Miss Kelly, on a cot at the foot of
+the girl's bed, heard her stirring restlessly but could not know in the
+darkness how her long, slender fingers tore at the bed-covering, nor how
+her face was drawn with pain.
+
+"The overturning of that chair,"--her mind whirled the events before
+her--"the sound of that whisper, that man's whisper, and the sight of
+that foot! He wore rubbers. I know he did. He always wears them when it's
+even cloudy. It was he! It was he!"
+
+Her nails dug into her palms as she fought for something like
+self-control.
+
+"If it was not he? I would never have fainted--never. That's what made me
+faint, the sickening, undeniable knowledge that that was who it was. And
+I loved him! But--but the rubber-shod foot, the size of it! Am I sure?
+Could it have been----"
+
+She groaned so that Miss Kelly lifted her head from her own pillow and
+listened intently, trying to determine whether the sufferer was asleep or
+awake.
+
+"He's not stupid," she swept on, closing mutinous lips against the
+repetition of sound. "He knew Enid could do nothing--nothing more. I
+don't understand. Oh, I don't understand! I wonder now why I said I heard
+nothing.
+
+"I wonder why I lay unconscious on the floor near the dining room door
+all those hours--until ten o'clock this morning. It was because the
+knowledge was too much for me to stand--just as it is too much now. And
+I can't share it with anybody. I'll never be able to get it off my
+conscience. If I did, they'd hang him--or the other one who----"
+
+At that thought, she screamed aloud, a wild, eerie sound that chilled the
+blood of even Miss Kelly, accustomed as she was to the cries of suffering
+and despair. The nurse was at the hysterical girl's side in a moment,
+holding her quivering body in strong, capable arms.
+
+"What was it? What was it, Miss Fulton?" she asked soothingly.
+
+Maria brushed the back of her hand across her forehead, which was beaded
+with big, cold drops of perspiration.
+
+"Nothing, Miss Kelly; nothing," she half-moaned. "A bad dream, a
+nightmare, I guess. Give me something to make me sleep."
+
+She drank eagerly from a glass the nurse put to her lips.
+
+"If I begin to talk in my sleep, Miss Kelly, call me, wake me up, will
+you?" she begged, the fright still in her voice.
+
+"Yes, I will." This reassuringly while Miss Kelly smoothed the pillows
+and readjusted the tumbled coverings.
+
+Maria grasped her arm in a grip that hurt.
+
+"But will you?" she demanded sharply. "Promise me!"
+
+"Yes; indeed, I will. I promise."
+
+Miss Kelly meant what she said. She was not anxious to be the recipient
+of the sick girl's confidences.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+EYES OF ACCUSATION
+
+
+Bristow, at his early breakfast, devoted himself, between mouthfuls, to
+the front page of _The Furmville Sentinel_. It was given up entirely to
+the Withers murder.
+
+"Murder--murder horrible and mysterious--was committed early yesterday
+morning," announced the paper in large black-face type, "when the
+beautiful and charming Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers, wife of George S.
+Withers, the well-known attorney of Atlanta, was choked to death in the
+parlour of her home at No. 5 Manniston Road. The most heinous crime that
+has ever stained the annals of Furmville," etc.
+
+The article went on to recite that Chief Greenleaf of the Furmville
+police force had been fortunate in securing the assistance of a genius in
+running down the various clues that seemed to point to the guilty party.
+Mr. Lawrence Bristow, of Cincinnati, now in town for his health, had
+worked with him all day in unearthing many circumstances "which, although
+each of them seemed trivial, led when summed up to the almost irrefutable
+conviction that the murder was done by a drunken negro, Perry Carpenter,"
+etc.
+
+In spite of this, the paper continued, the dead woman's husband, arriving
+unexpectedly on the scene, had employed by wire Samuel S. Braceway, the
+professional detective of Atlanta, who would reach Furmville early this
+morning and, probably, work with Chief Greenleaf, Mr. Bristow, and the
+plain-clothes squad in the effort to remove all doubts of the guilt of
+the accused negro.
+
+There followed a sketch of Braceway which was enough to convince the
+readers that in him Mr. Withers had called into the case the shrewdest
+man in the South, "very probably the shrewdest man in the entire
+country."
+
+"Evidently," Bristow was thinking when Greenleaf rang the door-bell,
+"while I'm a 'genius,' Braceway's the man everybody relies on when it
+comes to catching the murderer."
+
+The chief was in a hurry, and the two men, going out of Bristow's back
+door, walked down to the corner of the sleeping porch of No. 7, the
+nurses' home. The frail wire fences that had served to partition the back
+lots of Nos. 5, 7, and 9 had either fallen down or been carried away, but
+there was a tall five-board fence at the rear of the three lots. From
+this board fence, the hill sloped down toward the southeast, the
+direction in which the negro settlement containing the home of Lucy
+Thomas was located.
+
+Bristow, frankly bored by the belated search, let Greenleaf lead the way.
+
+"I went up to the sanitarium late last night," the chief told him, "and
+had a long talk with Miss Hardesty. She says the man she saw night before
+last was right here, just a few yards from this Number Seven sleeping
+porch; and, it seemed to her, he made straight for the board fence. We'll
+follow in his footsteps. That will take up to the fence in the middle of
+the rear line of Number Seven's lot."
+
+He was following this route as he talked, Bristow limping a few yards
+behind him.
+
+Greenleaf overlooked nothing. The lot had been cleared of last winter's
+leaves, and the search was comparatively simple, but, if he saw even so
+much as a small stick on either side of him, he turned it over. They were
+soon at the fence, about twenty yards from the sleeping porch.
+
+"There's not a trace--not a trace of anything, chief," said Bristow,
+leaning one elbow on the top board of the fence.
+
+Greenleaf, however, was not to be discouraged. After he had walked around
+again and again in ever-widening circles, he stopped and thought.
+
+"If that nigger was running away and trying to make good time," he
+exclaimed, suddenly inspired, "he didn't jump the fence in the middle
+there, where you are. He took a line slanting down toward that negro
+settlement. The chances are he went over the fence down at that corner."
+
+He pointed to the southeastern corner back of No. 5 and, with his eyes on
+the ground, began to work toward it.
+
+Barely a yard from the corner, he stooped down swiftly, picked up
+something and turned joyfully toward Bristow, who still leaned against
+the fence.
+
+"Look here! Look here, Mr. Bristow," he called, hurrying across to him.
+
+Bristow examined the object Greenleaf had found. It consisted of six
+links of a gold chain, three of the links very small and of plain gold,
+the other alternating three links being larger and chased with a fine,
+exquisite design of laurel leaves, the leaves so small as to be barely
+distinguishable to the naked eye.
+
+The lame man shared the chief's excitement.
+
+"By George! You've got something worth while. I should say so!"
+
+"What do you make of it?" asked Greenleaf, eager and pleased. "It must
+have belonged to Mrs. Withers, don't you think?"
+
+"There's one way to find out," Bristow answered, looking at his watch. It
+was half-past eight o'clock. "Let's go and ask Withers."
+
+They went around to the front of No. 5.
+
+"One of the end links is broken," Bristow said as they ascended the
+steps. "My guess is that this is a part of the necklace Mrs. Withers wore
+when she was killed. You remember the mark on the back of her neck. It
+might have been made by the jerk that would have been required to break
+these links."
+
+Miss Kelly, answering their ring, told them Mr. Withers had gone to the
+railroad station to meet Mr. Braceway.
+
+"Then, too," she added, "Miss Fulton's father is due on the nine o'clock
+train. Mr. Withers may stop down town to meet him."
+
+"I'd forgotten about that," said Bristow. "We'll have to ask your help."
+He handed her the fragment of chain. "Will you be so kind as to take
+that back to Miss Fulton and ask her whether she recognizes it, whether
+she can identify it?"
+
+Miss Kelly complied with the request at once.
+
+She returned in a few moments.
+
+"Miss Fulton," she reported, handing the links back to Bristow, "says
+this is a part of the chain Mrs. Withers wore round her neck night before
+last. She wore a lavalliere; it had two emeralds and eighteen rather
+small diamonds."
+
+"Good!" exclaimed Greenleaf, glancing at the lame man. "I guess that
+fixes Perry."
+
+"Undoubtedly," Bristow assented; and spoke to Miss Kelly: "I beg your
+pardon, but is Miss Fulton up this morning, or will she be up later?"
+
+"She's dressing now. She wants to be up to meet her father."
+
+"In that case, I'll wait until later. What I would like to have is a
+complete, detailed description of all of Mrs. Withers' jewelry. I wish
+you'd mention that to her, will you?"
+
+Greenleaf was anxious to return to his office.
+
+"This last piece of evidence," he said, "ought to go to the coroner's
+jury. It clinches the case against Perry. Here's the whole business in a
+nutshell: the buttons missing from his blouse, one found in Number Five,
+the other in your bungalow; Miss Hardesty's having seen him the night of
+the murder; the ease with which he undoubtedly got the kitchen key from
+Lucy Thomas; the imprint of his rubber-soled shoe on the porch; the
+finding of this piece of gold chain; and his failure to establish an
+alibi. It's more than enough to have him held for the grand jury--it's
+murder in the first degree."
+
+Bristow went back to his porch. Looking down to his left and through the
+trees, he commanded a view of Freeman Avenue.
+
+"When I see an automobile flash past that spot," he decided, "I'll hurry
+down to Number Five. I want to be there to witness the meeting between
+Miss Fulton and her father. It may be possible that, when this
+scandal--whatever it was--was about to break concerning Mrs. Withers,
+this family was lucky enough to have a negro hauled up as the murderer.
+In any event, it's up to me to keep track of the relations between
+Fulton, his daughter, Withers, and Morley. The psychology of the
+situation now is as important as any material evidence."
+
+He did not have long to wait. At a quarter past nine he caught a glimpse
+of a big car speeding out Freeman Avenue. He sprang to his feet, hurried
+down to No. 5, rang the bell, and was inside the living room by the time
+the machine had climbed up Manniston Road and deposited in front of the
+door its one passenger. He was a man of sixty-five or sixty-seven years
+of age, very white of hair, very erect of figure.
+
+Bristow did not have time or need to formulate an excuse for his presence
+before Mr. Fulton rushed up the steps to meet Maria. As she came from the
+direction of the bedrooms to greet him, her expression had in it
+reluctance, timidity even.
+
+The father and daughter met in the centre of the living room. Bristow,
+stationed near the corner by the door, could see their faces. He watched
+them with attention strained to the utmost.
+
+In the eyes of Maria there was a great fear mingled with a look of
+pleading. The old man's face was deep-lined; under his eyes were dark
+pouches; and his lips were tightly compressed, as if he sought to prevent
+his bursting into condemnation.
+
+With a little catch in her voice, Maria cried out, "Father!" and stood
+watching him.
+
+For a moment the old man's eyes were dreary with accusation. Bristow had
+never seen an emotion mirrored so clearly, so indisputably, in anybody's
+eyes. It was a speaking, thundering light, he thought.
+
+The father, without opening his mouth, plainly said to the girl:
+
+"At last, you've killed her! It's all your fault. You've killed her."
+
+Bristow read that as easily as if it had been held before him in printed
+words. So, apparently, did Miss Fulton. The pleading expression left her
+face, and, in place of it, was only a flourishing, lively fear.
+
+But Fulton put out his arms and gathered her into them, took hold of her
+mechanically, displaying neither fondness nor a desire to comfort and
+soothe.
+
+Bristow quietly left the room and returned to his porch.
+
+"Her father," he analyzed what he had seen, "blames her for the
+tragedy--possibly believes her guilty of the actual murder. Why? This is
+a new angle--brand new."
+
+He went in and called up Greenleaf, only to be told that the chief had
+left word he was to be found at the Brevord Hotel. Telephoning there, he
+got him on the wire.
+
+"Neither Withers nor Braceway came up here with old Mr. Fulton," he
+began.
+
+"I know," put in the chief. "I'm down here to meet Braceway now. He and
+Withers are in conference. Braceway doesn't want to go to the inquest.
+I'm to take him by the undertaker's to look at the body, and then he
+wants to run up to see you. Says he won't learn anything important at the
+inquest; he'd rather talk to you."
+
+"All right," returned Bristow. "That suits me perfectly. When will he be
+here?"
+
+"In half an hour, I suppose. And I'll run up as soon as the inquest is
+over."
+
+"I wonder," Bristow communed again with himself, "whether this Braceway
+is on the level, whether Withers is on the level. What's their game--to
+find the real murderer or to shut up a family scandal?"
+
+The scandal theory bothered him. He saw no way of getting at it.
+
+In less than an hour he and Braceway were shaking hands on the porch of
+No. 9. Bristow, studying him rapidly, motioned him to a chair.
+
+Here was no ordinary police-detective type. This man had neither
+square-toed shoes, nor a bull neck, nor coarseness of feature. About
+thirty-six years old, he was unusually slender, and straight as a dart,
+a peculiar and restless gracefulness characterizing all his movements. He
+seemed fairly to exude energy. He was keyed up to lightning-like motion.
+He gave the impression of having a brain that worked with the precision
+and force of some great machine, a machine that never missed fire.
+
+From the toes of his highly polished tan shoes to the sheen of his blond
+hair and the crown of his nobby straw hat, he looked like a well dressed
+and prosperous professional man. His dark gray suit with a thin thread of
+pale green in it, his silver-gray necktie, the gloves he carried in his
+left hand, every detail of his appearance marked him, first as a "snappy
+dresser," and second as a highly efficient man.
+
+While they exchanged casual greetings, Braceway lit a cigarette and spun
+the match, with a droning sound, far out from the porch. He did this, as
+he did everything else, with a "flaire," with that indefinable something
+which marks every man who has a strong personality. There was in all his
+bearing a dash, an electric emphasis.
+
+"What do you think, Mr. Bristow?" He got down to business at once. "Did
+this negro Perry kill Mrs. Withers?"
+
+Braceway blew out a big cloud of smoke and looked intently at his new
+acquaintance.
+
+"I've talked to Greenleaf," he supplemented. "I suppose he gave me all
+the facts you've collected. But Greenleaf--you know what I mean," he
+waved his cigarette hand expressively; "I wouldn't say he had
+extraordinary powers of divination. He's a good fellow, and all that,
+but--what do you think?"
+
+"On the evidence alone, so far," Bristow answered with an appreciative,
+warming smile, "I'd say Perry committed the crime."
+
+"Oh; yes, sure." He moved quickly in his chair. "On the evidence, but
+there are other things, other factors. What do you think?"
+
+"I'm afraid that's my trouble," Bristow told him. "I've been thinking so
+much that I'm somewhat muddled. But I believe there may be something more
+than a negro's greed back of this thing."
+
+"Now you're speaking mouthfuls," Braceway said, smiling brightly. "Tell
+me about it."
+
+Bristow told him--about Withers' peculiar behaviour; the whole case
+against Perry; the illusive personage with the chestnut beard and gold
+tooth; Morley's suspicious story and actions; and, lastly, Maria Fulton's
+highly puzzling narrative of what she had seen and not seen in connection
+with the murder.
+
+Braceway listened with complete absorption, in a way that showed he was
+photographing each incident and statement on his brain.
+
+"Now," he began with almost explosive suddenness, "let's get this
+straight. I want to work with you, if you'll let me." He paused long
+enough for Bristow to nod a pleased assent. "And I believe there's
+something back of this crime that nobody has yet put his finger on. Mr.
+Withers believes it. Don't make any mistake about that. Withers is as
+anxious to get the real criminal as you and I are."
+
+"Let me understand," Bristow said in his turn. "Do you propose that we
+work on the case with the supposition that Withers is in no way
+responsible for any part of the tragedy?"
+
+"Absolutely!" snapped out Braceway, thoroughly good natured despite his
+abruptness. "At least, that's my plan. I'm certain Withers had nothing to
+do with it."
+
+For the first time, something far back in Bristow's brain stirred
+uneasily, as if, miles away, somebody had sounded an alarm. Should he
+trust this man? Would Braceway try to pick up a false scent, try to throw
+the whole thing out of gear?
+
+Although he, Bristow, had expressed to Greenleaf only last night his
+confidence in Withers' innocence, would it be wise to hold to such a
+belief? The future was too uncertain, too apt to produce entirely
+unexpected things. At any rate, it would be silly to call himself
+anything of a criminologist; and yet go ahead with a blind, spoken
+conviction of the innocence of a man who unquestionably had acted in a
+way to bring suspicion upon himself.
+
+He would wait and see. He purposed to throw away no card that might later
+take a trick.
+
+"Very good," he said. "That suits me if you're satisfied. You can answer
+for him, I don't doubt."
+
+"Thoroughly so. In the first place, he and I are close personal friends;
+went to college together; were fraternity mates; had an office together
+until I quit practising law and went in for this sort of work. Then, too,
+I've turned him inside out this morning. He doesn't know a thing.
+
+"And, I might as well tell you now, he didn't hang around Manniston Road
+night before last after his wife got in. As soon as he saw this Douglas
+Campbell go home he returned to the Brevord and went to bed.
+
+"No, sirree! Here's what I work on: either Morley killed her, or the
+negro killed her, or it was done by the mysterious fellow with the gold
+tooth. How does that strike you?"
+
+"Correctly; I'm with you," agreed Bristow, still with the mental
+reservation that he would deal with Withers as he saw fit.
+
+"One thing more," added Braceway, and Bristow was surprised to see that
+he looked a trifle embarrassed; "I want you to handle all the talk that
+has to be had with Miss Maria Fulton. I'll be frank with you; I have to
+be. It's this way: I was once in love with her; in fact, engaged to marry
+her. Do you see?"
+
+"Fully."
+
+He was glad to know at the outset that Braceway was a friend of the
+family. It might be valuable later.
+
+Braceway threw away his cigarette and sighed with relief.
+
+"I'm glad you understand," he said. "Now, about Withers: things have
+begun to happen to him already--this morning. Since this has hit him, he
+doesn't know where he'll get off eventually. I'll tell you."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE $1,000 CHECK.
+
+
+A few minutes after eight o'clock that morning Mr. Illington, president
+of the Furmville National Bank, had called at the Brevord to see Mr.
+Withers, who, still holding his room there, was waiting for the delayed
+morning train.
+
+Mr. Illington was of the true banker type, fifty years old, immaculately
+dressed, thin of lip, hard of eye, slow and precise in his enunciation.
+He had, apparently, estranged himself from any deep, human feeling. The
+long handling of money had hardened him. His fingers were long and
+grasping, and his voice was quite as metallic as the clink of gold coins
+one upon the other.
+
+At Mr. Withers' invitation he took a chair in Mr. Withers' room. He
+rubbed his dry, slender hands together and cleared his throat, after
+which he spoke his little set speech of condolence.
+
+Mr. Withers, haggard from grief and lack of sleep, waved aside these
+preliminary remarks.
+
+The banker put his hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a bulky
+envelope, from which he produced a long, rectangular piece of paper.
+
+"I knew you would prefer to learn of this at first hand from the bank;
+indeed, from me, its president. Yesterday, Mr. Withers, a promissory
+note, a sixty-day note, for a thousand dollars fell due in the Furmville
+National Bank. You might like to see it. Here it is."
+
+He handed the piece of paper to Withers, who saw that the note had been
+signed by Maria Fulton and endorsed by Enid Fulton Withers. The husband
+of the dead woman was too astonished to comment.
+
+"We acted as--as leniently in the matter as we could, perhaps more
+leniently than was strictly proper in banking circles," Mr. Illington was
+pleased to explain. "I myself called up Miss Fulton on the telephone
+yesterday, but naturally she was so agitated that she seemed unable to
+give me any information as to what she intended to do regarding
+the--er--liquidation of this indebtedness."
+
+"And," concluded Withers, passing the note back to him, "since my wife
+was the endorser, it's up to me to make the note good, to pay the bank
+the thousand dollars."
+
+Mr. Illington was glad to see how thoroughly the bereaved husband
+appreciated the situation.
+
+"Quite right, entirely so," he said. "And will you?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Ahem--When?" inquired the banker, assuming an expression of casual
+interest.
+
+"I haven't that much money on deposit in Atlanta, but I can get it. I
+return to Atlanta this afternoon. I can send the money to you tomorrow.
+Will that answer?"
+
+"Oh, perfectly, perfectly," assented Mr. Illington, much reassured. "We
+are always glad, at the Furmville National, to do the reasonable and
+accommodating thing. Yes; that will be thoroughly satisfactory.--Ahem!
+I have a new note here. You might sign it? To keep things regular, in
+order."
+
+Withers signed the new note. It was for five days.
+
+Illington got to his feet with stiff dignity.
+
+"Glad to accommodate you, Mr. Withers; very glad. I wish you good
+morning," he concluded, going toward the door.
+
+"Good-bye," replied Withers absently, but looked up suddenly. "By the
+way, I might like to know something about the disposition of that
+thousand dollars. Could you tell me anything concerning it?"
+
+Mr. Illington came back to his chair and reseated himself, again
+producing the bulky envelope.
+
+"I was prepared for just such a request, a perfectly natural request," he
+answered Withers question, plainly approving of his own forehandedness.
+
+He took from the envelope and passed to Withers a canceled check.
+
+"This," he said, "gives you the information you desire. You see, I
+gathered from the newspaper reports this morning and from the gossip of
+the street yesterday afternoon that there might be more or less of--er--a
+mystery in this--ah--distressing situation. Consequently, I brought along
+this check which, curiously enough, had not been called for by the maker
+of it."
+
+Withers, disregarding the banker's remarks, was studying the check. It
+had been signed by Enid Fulton Withers, to whom the $1,000 loan had
+evidently been credited at the Furmville National. It was for $1,000, and
+it was made payable to Maria Fulton. Maria Fulton had indorsed it, and,
+below her endorsement, appeared that of Henry Morley, showing that the
+money had passed directly into the hands of Morley.
+
+"That's all I wanted to know," Withers said quietly, giving the check
+back to Illington. "I'm much obliged."
+
+This time Illington departed, taking himself off with a feeling of having
+done his duty with promptitude and according to the best business ethics.
+
+His visit had prevented Withers' meeting the train, and Fulton had gone
+directly to Manniston Road.
+
+Braceway, going to the hotel on the banker's heels, was admitted by
+Withers, who broke into a storm of futile, highly coloured profanity.
+
+"Brace," he said, "you'll get the devil who's caused all this, won't you?
+You know what my life has been! You'll get him if you have to tear up
+heaven and earth."
+
+"Sure! Sure!" Braceway declared. "Keep yourself together. Let me do the
+worrying. I'll get him if he's above the sod."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"So, you see," Braceway said, in reciting the incident to Bristow, "we're
+getting a little warm on the scent. This Morley, this wooer of Maria,
+seems to have his head within stinging range of the hornets, doesn't he?"
+
+"Undoubtedly."
+
+"What do you make of it?" pressed Braceway.
+
+Bristow thought a little while.
+
+"It might be this," he advanced: "Morley is in trouble with his bank,
+short in his accounts--probably has been for several months. Two months
+ago, sixty-one days ago, he confided to Miss Fulton that he stood in
+great danger of arrest, pointed out that he had made a mistake, asked
+assistance from her, told her a thousand dollars would arrange things.
+
+"But, instead of paying the thousand into the bank, he went to gambling
+with it in the hope of trebling or quadrupling it and--lost it. In other
+words, he's been afraid to tell his financée how much he really owed the
+bank and then played the thousand to win enough to enable him to square
+himself."
+
+"Once more," observed the Atlanta man, "you speak in mouthfuls."
+
+"Again and further--of course, all this is on the theory that Morley is a
+pusillanimous kind of man; but he would have to be just that to be taking
+money from a woman, any woman, much less the one to whom he is engaged to
+be married--again and further, when he had lost the thousand and saw ruin
+just ahead of him again, he ran down here and asked for more money.
+
+"Perhaps, Mrs. Withers, at her sister's tearful request, had previously
+raised more than a thousand for him, had added to that thousand other
+money obtained from pawning some of her jewelry; and he now insisted that
+Maria make Mrs. Withers go the limit and pawn _all_ her jewelry.
+
+"By George!" Bristow concluded. "That may explain the quarrel which Miss
+Rutgers, the trained nurse in Number Seven, heard the two sisters engaged
+in the day before the murder. Yes; it might. Evidently, Mrs. Withers
+refused to be bled further. After that, what? What would you say?"
+
+"It's plain enough," Braceway answered. "There was Morley, crazed by the
+fear of arrest and conviction for embezzlement. There was Mrs. Withers,
+still possessing and holding enough jewelry to get him out of trouble, if
+he had time to convert the jewels into cash and to get back to his bank
+with the money.
+
+"What was the result of that situation? Evidently, he never intended to
+catch that midnight train. He did what he had planned to do, came back to
+Number Five, confronted Mrs. Withers soon after her escort had left her
+at the door, demanded the jewels, was refused; and then, in a blind rage
+or a panic, killed her and stole the jewels."
+
+"There's no use blinking the fact," said Bristow in a quiet, calculating
+way, trying to keep in his mind all the other peculiar circumstances
+surrounding this crime. "From the way we've put it, the thing reads as
+plainly as a primer. Now, what are we to do? Even now, we haven't the
+proof on him--any real proof."
+
+"Suppose," said Braceway, "we let him leave Furmville, let him go back
+to Washington, with the hope that he does pawn the stuff he's stolen?"
+
+"And suppose," Bristow added, "we get a detailed description of all the
+jewelry Mrs. Withers owned, and wire that description to the police of
+the principal towns between here and Washington and between here and
+Atlanta. We'll make the request, of course, that they watch the pawnshops
+and nab anybody who shows up with any of the Withers stuff?"
+
+"That's it! That's it as sure as you're born!" Braceway struck the arm of
+his chair and catapulted himself into a standing position. "That will get
+him--provided, of course, he's desperate enough to take the chance of
+pawning any of it."
+
+"One other thing," Bristow supplemented. "You said Withers said something
+to you this morning about your knowing what his life had been. Just what
+did he mean?"
+
+Braceway reflected a moment,
+
+"There's no reason for your not knowing it," he confided. "Withers
+had rather a trying life with his wife. It was a baffling sort of a
+situation. She was in love with him. I haven't a doubt of that. And he
+was in love with her.
+
+"She was one of the most fascinating women I ever saw. They used to say
+in Atlanta that all the women liked her, and that any man who had once
+shaken hands with her and looked her in the eye was, forever after, her
+obedient servant.
+
+"But she was never entirely frank with Withers. Naturally, that at first
+made him regretful, and later it made him jealous. You know his type.
+I'm not sure that I have the whole story, but that's the foundation of
+it, and it led to bitter disagreements and fierce quarrels.
+
+"Some of their acquaintances got on to it, and couldn't understand why a
+woman like her and a good fellow like Withers couldn't hit it off. Things
+got worse and worse. I don't believe Withers minded her being up here
+with her sister. The temporary separation came, probably, as a great
+relief to both of them."
+
+"I see," Bristow said. "Naturally, when, on top of all that, the money
+began to fly and the jewels went into pawn, he came to the end of his
+rope--determined to put a stop to the thing."
+
+"Probably," said Braceway, looking at his watch. "But how about our
+little job--getting the description of the jewelry and having Greenleaf
+wire it out? I'll go down to Number Five and get it from Withers and his
+father-in-law."
+
+"You don't mind seeing Miss Fulton?" Bristow asked interestedly.
+
+"Oh, no," he answered, embarrassment again in his manner. "But I don't
+feel like cross-questioning her. You can understand that. You'll have to
+take on that end, really."
+
+Bristow thought: "He's still in love with her. I was right about her.
+There's a lot to her if she can hold a live wire like this." Aloud he
+said:
+
+"All right. You get the list. In the meantime, I'll telephone Greenleaf
+to tell Morley he can go to Washington tomorrow if he wants to--but not
+today."
+
+"Why not today?"
+
+"Because there are some things here you and I had better go over, and I
+think we'd do well to follow Morley, don't you? That is, if we want to
+get the goods on him without fail."
+
+"Now that I think of it, yes. Perhaps, both of us needn't go, but one
+will have to."
+
+He went down the steps, saying Withers had by this time arrived at No. 5
+and would be waiting there with Mr. Fulton. Both the father and the
+husband would accompany the body of Mrs. Withers to Atlanta on the four
+o'clock train that afternoon.
+
+Bristow, having caught Greenleaf by telephone at the inquest, gave him
+their decision about Morley's departure the next day, and announced that
+he and Braceway would like him to send out by wire the description of the
+Withers jewels. To both of these propositions Greenleaf agreed. Bristow
+returned to his porch.
+
+"So," he thought, "it's got to be Morley or the negro."
+
+And yet, he decided, in spite of the theorizing he and Braceway had
+indulged in, there was small chance now of fixing the crime definitely on
+Morley. He had none of the jewelry, apparently. The police had searched
+his baggage and his room at the hotel, without success. Indubitably, it
+would be more likely that a jury would convict Perry. All the direct
+evidence was against the negro.
+
+Bristow did not deceive himself. It would be a great satisfaction and a
+morsel to his vanity to prove the negro guilty. He foresaw that the
+papers sooner or later would get hold of the fact that Braceway was after
+Morley.
+
+And, although they had hinted at mystery and uncertainty this morning,
+they had printed their stories so as to show that Greenleaf, backed by
+Bristow, would try to get Perry. The duel between himself and Braceway
+was on. He remembered he had discounted at the beginning the idea of the
+negro's guilt, but that had been before the discovery of the fragment of
+the lavalliere chain.
+
+Now, he was disposed, determined even, to treat everything as if Perry
+were the guilty man. He would work with that idea always in mind. In
+the meantime he would go with Braceway as long as the Braceway theories
+seemed to have any foundation at all. He did not want to run the risk of
+being shown up as a bungler. He was anxious to be "in on" anything that
+might happen.
+
+"So," he concluded, "if Perry is finally convicted, I get the credit. If
+Morley is sent up, I'll get some of the credit for that also. I won't
+lose either way.
+
+"Now, about Withers? I've got to handle him by myself. If I were
+analyzing this case from the newspaper accounts of it, I'd say at first
+blush that either Withers did the thing or Perry did it. That's what the
+public's saying now.
+
+"But Braceway stands as a fence between Withers and me. He's a friend of
+Withers and in love with Withers' sister-in-law. And he believes Withers
+innocent. That's patent. For the present, I can't do anything in that
+direction. I've got to dig up everything possible on Morley and the
+negro--and, in spite of the check business, the chances are against the
+negro."
+
+He called to Mattie whom he heard moving about in the dining room.
+
+"Lucy Thomas," he said, "is out of jail now. I wish you'd go look for her
+right away. The inquest is over by this time, and she'll be at home by
+the time you get there. Bring her back here with you. Tell her it's by
+order of the police, and I only want to talk to her a few minutes."
+
+"Yas, suh," said Mattie.
+
+"I'm not going to hurt her, Mattie," he said. "Be sure to tell her so."
+
+"Yas, suh, Mistuh Bristow; I sho' will tell her. I 'spec' dat po' nigger
+is done had de bre'f skeered outen her already."
+
+His eye was caught by the figures of Braceway and Mr. Fulton leaving No.
+5. They turned and started up the walk toward No. 9.
+
+"Mr. Fulton," Braceway explained, after the introduction to Bristow,
+"wants to tell you something about his--about Mrs. Withers. It brings in
+further complications--hard ones for us."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE MAN WITH THE GOLD TOOTH
+
+
+Mr. Fulton's arms trembled as he put his hands on the arms of a chair and
+seated himself with the deliberateness of his years. In his face the
+lines were still deep, and once or twice his mouth twisted as if with
+actual pain, but there was in his eyes the flame of an indomitable will.
+He was by no means a crushed and weak old man. Neither the terrific blow
+of his daughter's death nor the reverses he had suffered in his business
+affairs had broken him.
+
+"What I have to say," he began, looking first at Braceway and then at
+Bristow, "is not a pleasant story, but it has to be told."
+
+His low-pitched, modulated voice was clear and without a tremor. His
+glance at the two men gave them the impression that he paid them a
+certain tribute.
+
+"Both of you," he continued, "are gentlemen. Mr. Braceway, you're a
+personal friend of my son-in-law. Mr. Bristow, I know you will respect my
+confidence, in so far as it can be respected."
+
+They both bowed assent. At the same moment the telephone rang. Bristow
+excused himself and answered it. The chief of police was on the wire.
+
+"It's all over!" his voice sounded jubilantly. "It's all over, and I want
+you to congratulate me, congratulate me and yourself. It was quick work."
+
+"What do you mean?" queried Bristow.
+
+"The inquest is over. The coroner's jury found that Mrs. Withers came to
+her death at the hands of Perry Carpenter."
+
+"And you're satisfied?"
+
+"Sure, I'm satisfied! We've found the guilty man, and he's under lock and
+key. What more do I want? I'll tell you what, I'll be up to have dinner
+with you in a little while. I invite myself," this with a chuckle. "You
+and I will have a little celebration dinner. It is a go?"
+
+"By all means. I'll be delighted to have you, and I want to hear all
+about the inquest."
+
+Bristow went back to the porch.
+
+"That," he told them, "was a message from the chief of police. He says
+the coroner's jury has held the negro, Perry Carpenter, for the crime."
+
+Mr. Fulton moved forward in his chair, his hands clutching the arms of it
+tightly.
+
+"I'll never believe it, never!" he declared, evidently indignant.
+"Nothing will ever persuade me that Enid, Mrs. Withers, met her death at
+the hands of an ordinary negro burglar."
+
+"What makes you so positive of that?" Bristow asked curiously.
+
+"Because of what has happened in the past," Fulton replied with emphasis.
+"I was about to tell you. This man none of you have been able to find,
+this man with the gold tooth, has been in Enid's life for a good many
+years. I don't understand why you haven't found him; I really don't."
+
+"We haven't had two whole days to work on this case yet," Bristow
+reminded him politely. "Many developments may arise."
+
+"I hope so; I hope so," he said sharply. "That man must be found."
+
+"One moment," Braceway put in with characteristic quickness; "how do you
+know he's been in your daughter's life, Mr. Fulton?"
+
+"That goes back to the beginning of my story." He looked out across the
+trees and roofs of the town toward the mountains.
+
+"Enid was always my favourite daughter. I suppose it's a mistake to
+distinguish between one's children, to favour one beyond the other. But
+she was just that--my favourite daughter--always. She had a dash, a
+spirit, a joyous soul. Years ago I saw that she would develop into a
+fascinating womanhood.
+
+"Nothing disturbed me until she was nineteen. Then she fell in love. It
+was while she was spending a summer at Hot Springs, Virginia. The trouble
+was not in her falling in love. It was that she never told me the name of
+the man she loved." He leaned back again and sighed. "She never did tell
+me. I never knew.
+
+"I never knew, because, when she was twenty, she came to me with the
+unexpected announcement that she was going to marry George Withers.
+I was surprised. She was not the kind to change in her likes and
+dislikes. And I knew Withers was not the man she had originally loved.
+Nevertheless, I asked her no questions, and she was married to Withers
+when she was barely twenty-one.
+
+"A year later, approximately four years ago, she and my other daughter,
+Maria, spent six weeks at Atlantic City in the early spring. It was there
+that she got into trouble. I could detect it in her letters. Some
+tremendous sorrow or difficulty had overtaken her, and she was fighting
+it alone.
+
+"Her husband was not with her. I wrote to Maria asking her to investigate
+quietly, to report to me whether there was anything I could do.
+
+"Maria's report was unsatisfactory. She knew Enid was distressed and was
+giving away or risking in some manner large amounts of money--even
+pawning her jewelry, jewelry which I had given her and which she prized
+above everything else. The whole thing was a mystery, Maria wrote. The
+very next mail I received a letter from Enid asking me to lend her two
+thousand dollars.
+
+"She made no pretence of explaining why she wanted it. She didn't have to
+explain. I was a rich man at that time, comparatively speaking, and she
+knew I would give her the money.
+
+"I mailed her a check for two thousand, but on the train which carried
+the check I sent a private detective--not to make any arrests, you
+understand, not to raise any row or start any scandal. I merely wanted to
+find out what or who troubled her. Women, you know, particularly good
+women, are prone to fall into the hands of unscrupulous people.
+
+"Four days later the detective reported to me, but it was of no special
+value. He couldn't tell me where the two thousand had gone. If Enid had
+paid it to a man or a woman, the fellow had missed seeing the
+transaction. With the description of the jewels I had given him, however,
+he made a round of the pawnshops in Atlantic City and learned that all of
+them had been pawned--for a total of seven thousand."
+
+"Pawned by whom--herself?" asked Bristow.
+
+"No. They were pawned in different shops by a man with a gold tooth and a
+thick, chestnut-brown beard."
+
+"No wonder you doubt the negro's guilt!" exclaimed Braceway.
+
+"Excuse me," put in Bristow quickly, "but did you ever mention this to
+Mr. Withers?"
+
+"Certainly, not," Fulton answered. "I never told it to a living soul. And
+as my inquiries had netted me practically nothing, I was obliged to let
+the matter drop. It was bad enough for me to have interfered with her, my
+daughter and a married woman, in the hope of helping her. Most assuredly,
+I could not have distressed her, degraded her, by telling her a detective
+had been investigating her."
+
+"And that was the end of it?" asked Braceway.
+
+"Not quite. She went back to Atlanta. Withers wanted to know where her
+jewels were. She wrote to me in an agony of fear and sorrow, asking me to
+redeem the jewels. I did it. I went to Atlantic City myself. She had sent
+me the tickets. It cost me seven thousand dollars."
+
+"That was four years ago?" Braceway continued the inquiry.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Did Miss Maria Fulton at that time know Henry Morley?"
+
+"No; I think not. I think Morley's been a friend of hers for about three
+years."
+
+The three were silent, each busy with the same thought: that Morley was
+being blamed for a series of acts at this time which duplicated what had
+happened four years ago when he was unknown to the Fulton family, with
+this distinction, that this last time murder had been added to the
+blackmail or whatever it was. And the theory of his guilt was weakened.
+
+"Mr. Withers has told me," Bristow said, "that there was a repetition of
+the pawning of the jewels in Washington about a year ago."
+
+"That's true," confirmed Fulton. "But on that occasion I knew nothing of
+what had happened until Enid came to me, again with the request that I
+redeem the jewelry. Her husband had arrived in Washington unexpectedly,
+precipitating the crisis. I gave her the money. The sum this time was
+eight thousand dollars."
+
+"And that ended it, Mr. Fulton?"
+
+The old man looked out again toward the mountains as if he sought to gain
+some of their serenity.
+
+"No. That time I asked her what troubled her. I explained that I would
+blame her for nothing, that I only wanted to help her, to give her
+comfort. But she wouldn't tell me anything. She declared that nobody
+could help her and that, anyway, there would never be a repetition of the
+extortion.
+
+"She wept bitterly--I can hear her weeping now--and she begged me to
+believe that she had been guilty of nothing--nothing criminal or immoral.
+I told her I could never believe that of her.
+
+"'It doesn't affect me alone. I'll have to fight it out the best way I
+can,' was all the explanation she could bring herself to give me. The one
+fact she revealed was that the man concerned in the Atlantic City affair
+had also been responsible for her trouble in Washington."
+
+Bristow, absorbed in every word of the story, recollected at once that
+Mrs. Allen had received the same explanation when she had tried to
+comfort Mrs. Withers.
+
+"By George!" said Braceway, his voice a little husky. "She was game all
+right--game to the finish."
+
+"I think," said Fulton, relaxing suddenly so that his whole form seemed
+to sag and grow weak, "that's all I wanted to tell you. It's all I can
+tell--all I know. I wanted to show you that this man with the gold tooth
+and the brown beard is no myth, as you seem to believe.
+
+"Make no mistake about him, gentlemen. He has ability, ability which he
+uses only for unworthy ends." The old man sucked in his lips and bit on
+them. "He's elusive, slippery, working always in the dark.
+
+"He's low, base. He wouldn't stop at murder. And I'm certain he was
+the principal figure in my daughter's death. Nothing--no power on
+earth--nobody can ever make me believe that Enid was murdered by the
+negro. It doesn't fit in with what has gone before."
+
+"If there's any way to find this man, we'll do it," Bristow assured him.
+
+Braceway sprang to his feet.
+
+"You can bet your last dollar on that, Mr. Fulton," he said heartily, "If
+he's to be found, we'll get him."
+
+The old man got to his feet. The recital of his story had weakened him.
+His legs were a little unsteady. Braceway took him by the arm, and they
+started down the steps.
+
+"Will I see you again this afternoon?" Bristow called to the Atlanta
+detective.
+
+"I rather think so," Braceway threw back over his shoulder. "As soon as
+I've had lunch I want to talk to Abrahamson. Chief Greenleaf seems to
+have neglected him."
+
+Bristow hesitated a moment, then limped down the steps.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Mr. Fulton," he said, overtaking the two, "but is
+there nothing more, no hint, no probable clue, you can give us about this
+mysterious man?"
+
+"Absolutely nothing," Fulton answered wearily. "I've told you all I
+know."
+
+"You gave him--rather, you gave your daughter for him a total of
+seventeen thousand dollars, counting the loan of two thousand and the
+cost of redeeming the jewels both times. I beg your pardon for seeming
+insistent, but is it possible that you passed over that much money
+without even asking why she had been obliged to use it? Not many people
+would credit such a thing."
+
+Fulton smiled, and for a moment his grief seemed lightened by the hint of
+happy memories.
+
+"Ah, you didn't know my daughter, sir," he said. "She was irresistible,
+not to be denied--one of the ardent flames of life. If she had asked me,
+I would have given her treble that amount--anything, anything, sir."
+
+Bristow thought of what had been said of her in Atlanta: that all women
+liked her and that any man who had shaken hands with her was her
+unquestioning servant. Surely such a woman would have been irresistible
+in her requests to her father.
+
+He ventured another line of inquiry:
+
+"When you arrived at Number Five this morning, I was in the living room,
+and I saw the meeting between you and Miss Maria Fulton. I came away as
+soon as I could, but I couldn't help noting your expression as you
+greeted her. It seemed to me that there was accusation in it."
+
+"There was," the old man assented. "Enid had written me that Maria had
+been pressing her for money, too much money. Naturally, when I heard of
+the--the tragedy, I coupled it with the old, old thing that had always
+been a burden on Enid--money. And this time I blamed Maria. Of course,
+however, that was a mistake."
+
+"I see," said Bristow.
+
+He returned to his porch and sat down. He went over all that the father
+of the dead woman had told him. So far as he could see, it had only
+served the purpose of strengthening the case against Morley. Let it be
+discovered that Maria had known Morley at the time of the Atlantic City
+affair, and the case would be fixed, irrefutable. And Braceway would
+win out.
+
+Of course, there was still one chance. There was the bare possibility
+that Morley had gone to No. 5 to murder Enid if he did not get more money
+from her, and that he had been frustrated by the fact that the negro
+Perry had forestalled him and done the murder first. Having advanced it,
+Bristow did not care to abandon the theory that Perry was the guilty man.
+
+An automobile whirled up Manniston Road and stopped in front of No. 9.
+His physician, Dr. Mowbray, sprang from the car and up the steps.
+
+"Good morning, doctor!" the patient called out cheerily.
+
+"Hello!" answered Mowbray crustily. "But what's the big idea in your
+trying to do a Sherlock Holmes in this murder case?"
+
+The doctor was overbearing and opinionated. He had many patients, who
+were in the habit of knotowing to him and obeying his instructions
+implicitly. It was something which he required.
+
+"Sit down," invited Bristow. "I'm not doing any Sherlock Holmes stuff,
+but I thought I ought to help out if I could."
+
+"Well, you can't!" snapped Mowbray, with quick, nervous gestures. "You'll
+be in your grave before you know it. You can't stand this." He shot out
+his hand and produced his watch with the celerity of a sleight-of-hand
+performer. "Let me feel your pulse."
+
+Bristow surrendered his wrist to the professional fingers.
+
+"Just what I thought--twenty beats too fast. And your respiration's a
+crime. Have you had any rest at all, today or yesterday?"
+
+"Not much, doctor."
+
+Mowbray glowered at him.
+
+"Well, you'll have to have it! You ought to be in bed this minute. If you
+don't carry out my instructions, I'll drop the case. You know that."
+
+"I'm sorry, doctor, but I can't spend my time in bed now," Bristow said
+as persuasively as he could.
+
+"I'd like to know why! Why? Why?"
+
+"I'm going to Washington tomorrow, although that's a secret. I merely
+confide it to you in a professional way, and----"
+
+"Going to Washington! Man, you're mad--mad! You'll have a hemorrhage or
+something, and die--die, I tell you!"
+
+"Nevertheless," Bristow insisted, "I must go."
+
+"About this murder?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Very well!" snorted Mowbray, rising like a jumping-jack. "Go--go to the
+North Pole if you wish. I'm through! I can't treat a man who defies my
+orders and advice. Good morning, sir."
+
+Bristow gave him no answer, and he ran down the steps and threw himself
+into his car.
+
+"Mistuh Bristow, Lucy's done come," said Mattie, at the living room door.
+
+Bristow started to leave his chair, but changed his mind.
+
+"Tell her to wait a few minutes," he said.
+
+He began to think and to determine just what he wanted to find out from
+Lucy, what she would say and what he wanted her to say. It would not do
+to question her before he felt sure of what she knew and what she must
+confess. He rocked gently in his chair, going over several times the
+evidence he desired. His face was hard-set, almost like marble, as he
+stared at the mountains. He was thinking harder at that moment than he
+had done at any time since the murder.
+
+He had it now. She had given Perry the key to the Withers kitchen--or,
+better still, Perry had taken it from her--and she remembered every
+detail of it, his departure from her house and his return with the key.
+That was what she had to confess. Inevitably, he argued, that would be
+her story, or else she would have no story at all.
+
+He thought of Braceway. He made now no secret of the fact that a struggle
+between himself and the Atlanta man was on--not openly, but thoroughly
+understood by both of them--a fight for supremacy, a contest in which he
+sought to convict Perry while Braceway worked for the conviction of
+Morley.
+
+Braceway had the added incentive of wanting to run down the man who had
+destroyed his friend's home life; and Braceway believed that Morley and
+Morley's money entanglements had, in some way, caused the tragedy.
+
+Well, he, Bristow, would see about that! He knew he had the best of the
+argument so far--and he looked forward to a double pleasure: the applause
+that would come to him as the result of Perry's conviction, and his own
+personal gratification at besting Braceway at his own game.
+
+He went into the unused bedroom and told Mattie to send Lucy Thomas to
+him there. While he waited, he closed the two windows.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+LUCY THOMAS TALKS
+
+
+Lucy came slowly into the room and stood near the door. She was of the
+peculiar-looking negress type sometimes seen in the South--light of
+complexion, with hard, porcelain-like blue eyes and kinky hair which,
+instead of being black, is brown or brownish red. After her first
+startled glance toward Bristow she stood with her head lowered and with
+an expression of sulky stubbornness.
+
+"Sit down!" he ordered after a few moments' silence, indicating a chair
+near the wall.
+
+She took her seat while he stepped to the door and closed it.
+
+"Now, Lucy," he said, pulling at his lower lip as he stood in the middle
+of the room and looked down at her, "I'm not going to hurt you, and
+there's nothing for you to be afraid of. All I want you to do is to tell
+me the truth."
+
+In spite of his reassuring words, the woman caught the full meaning of
+the goading sharpness in his voice. She immediately became more sullen.
+
+"'Deed, I ain' got nothin' to tell 'bout you white folks," she said, with
+a touch of insolence.
+
+"This isn't about white folks," he corrected her, resisting his quick
+impulse to anger. "It's about coloured folks."
+
+"Nothin' 'bout dem neithuh," she continued in the same tone. "I don' know
+nothin' 'cep'n I wuz drunk. I done tole all dat down at de p'lice
+station."
+
+"Listen to me!" he commanded, a little pale, "You know perfectly well
+what I want to find out. I want you to tell me everything you remember
+about Perry Carpenter's actions and words last Monday night--the night
+before last."
+
+She raised and lowered her eyes rapidly, the lids working like the
+shutter of a camera.
+
+"I knows what you wants, an' I knows I don' know nothin' 'tall 'bout it,"
+she objected, her sullenness a patent defiance.
+
+He stared at her for a full two minutes. She could hear the breath
+whistling between his teeth; the sound of it frightened her.
+
+"Don't lie to me!" he said, now a trifle hoarse. "It isn't necessary, and
+it doesn't do anybody any good--you or Perry either."
+
+She began to whimper.
+
+Looking at her, he was conscious of being absorbed in the attempt to keep
+his temper instead of eliciting what she had to tell. He smiled.
+
+"Stop that sniffling, and tell me what you know about Monday night! Don't
+you remember that Perry told you he was going to Mrs. Withers' house and
+steal her jewelry?"
+
+"I done tole you I don' remembuh nothin'."
+
+He took a step toward her and lifted his open hand as if to strike her in
+the face. Without waiting for the blow, she slid from the chair and fell
+sprawling to the floor, where she lay, moaning.
+
+"Get up!"
+
+She obeyed him, her arms held folded over her head as a shield against
+expected blows. She was still sullen, uncommunicative, her head down.
+
+He limped swiftly to the door, left the room and went to the front part
+of the house. He paced the length of the living room several times, his
+fists clenched, his protuberant lip grown heavier.
+
+He called to Mattie, who was in the kitchen.
+
+"I wish," he directed, "you'd go down to Sterrett's and get a dozen
+oranges."
+
+"Yes, suh. Right now, Mistuh Bristow?"
+
+"Yes; hurry. I want some orangeade."
+
+He returned to the bedroom and closed the door. Lucy was bent forward on
+the chair, moaning.
+
+"Stop that!" he said, feeling now that he had himself and her under
+control. "If you don't stop, you'll have something real to sniffle about
+before I'm through with you! Now begin. What about Perry last Monday
+night?"
+
+"Please, suh," she changed her tone, "lemme go. I ain' got nothin' to
+say. I feels like I might say somethin' dat ain' so. I'se kinder skeered
+you might make me say somethin' whut I don' mean to say."
+
+Moving deliberately, a fine, little tremor in his fingers, he took off
+his coat and vest and hung them on the back of a chair. He had just
+noticed that it was warm and close in the shut-up room. There was a
+ringing in his ears. He kept repeating to himself that, if he lost his
+temper, she would never become communicative.
+
+He began all over again, patient, persistent----
+
+When Mattie came back with the oranges, she met Lucy just outside the
+kitchen door. There were no tears in the Thomas woman's eyes, but she
+seemed greatly distressed.
+
+"Whut'd he want offen you?" Mattie asked, with the negro's usual
+curiosity.
+
+"Nothin' much," replied the other, looking blankly out across Mattie's
+shoulder. "He jes' axed me whut I knowd 'bout Perry dat night."
+
+"I tole you dar warn't nothin' to be skeered uv him foh," said Mattie.
+"Some uv you niggers ain' got no sense."
+
+"Yas; dat's so," Lucy agreed dully, and walked slowly away.
+
+She moved as if she felt that there was something frightful behind her.
+When she was half-way home, she broke into a run, and, moaning, ran the
+remainder of the distance. She threw herself on her bed and sobbed a long
+time.
+
+She had talked, and for the present she thought she felt more sorry for
+Perry than she did for herself.
+
+In the meantime, Bristow had gone into the bathroom to wash his hands.
+
+"Pah!" he exclaimed, disgusted.
+
+He dried his hands and walked, whistling, out to the living room. No
+matter how distasteful the scene with the sullen woman had been, the
+substantial fact remained that he had in his pocket an important
+document. After all, Lucy Thomas had talked--and signed.
+
+"Mattie," he called, "fix me an orangeade, please. Mr. Greenleaf's late
+for dinner, and I need a little freshening up."
+
+He went to the living room window again and gazed, with thoughtful,
+slightly sad eyes, out toward the mountains.
+
+"These policemen!" he was thinking contemptuously. "They don't know how
+to make blockheads tell what they can tell. There are ways--and ways."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE PAWN BROKER TAKES THE TRAIL
+
+
+Frank Abrahamson, pawn broker and junk dealer, responded at once to
+Braceway's warm smile. The Jew had his racial respect for keenness and
+clean-cut ability. He liked this man who, dressed like a dandy, spoke
+with the air of authority.
+
+"The fellow with the gold tooth?" he replied to Braceway's request for
+information. "Was there anything peculiar about him? Why, yes. He was
+clothed in peculiarities."
+
+The pawn broker, thin, round-shouldered, with a great hook-nose and
+cavernous, bright eyes, spoke rapidly, without an accent, punctuating his
+sentences with thrusts and dartings and waves of his two hands. His
+fifty-five years had not lessened his vitality.
+
+"You see, Mr. Braceway, we pawn brokers, we have to observe our
+customers. We become judges of human nature. At the best, we have a hard
+time making a living." Somehow, with his smile, he discounted this
+statement. "And we come to judge men as closely as we examine jewels and
+precious metals. You see?"
+
+Braceway saw. He lit a cigarette and stepped to the door to throw away
+the match. The Jew appreciated the thoughtfulness. Trash on the floor
+made the morning task of sweeping up harder.
+
+"Now," continued Abrahamson, expressing with one movement of his arm
+tolerant ridicule, "this man with the gold tooth and the brown beard--he
+thought he was disguised. By gracious! it was funny. A fellow like me
+takes one look at him and sees the disguise. The gold tooth--that was
+false, fake. When he talked to me, it was all I could do to keep from
+reaching across the counter and pushing that tooth more firmly into his
+jaw. Gold is heavy, you see. I was afraid it might drop down on my
+showcase and break some glass."
+
+Abrahamson laughed. So did Braceway.
+
+"And his beard, Mr. Braceway? That was better. To the ordinary
+observer, it might have looked natural--but not to me. Oh, yes; he was
+disguised--too much.--Besides, the other afternoon was not the first time
+I had seen him--no."
+
+"You saw him two months ago, then?"
+
+"Yes, sir--two months ago, and one month before that."
+
+"In here?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What did he want?"
+
+"Money. Money for jewelry. Oh, he had the jewelry. And I gave him the
+money--a great deal; more, perhaps, than was good for me, when you
+remember I always try to make a reasonable profit. He argued. He knew
+about values."
+
+This interested Braceway more than anything he had yet heard.
+
+"That gave you an idea," he suggested.
+
+"You are quick, Mr. Braceway. It did give me an idea. It made me think:
+well! This man, he has pawned things before, these very same things.
+He knew quite well what they should bring." Abrahamson shrugged his
+shoulders. "And he did know--and I let him have the money. That is, I
+mean, what happened the first two times. This last time, the three days
+ago, he was different, in a hurry, and he took only what I offered. He
+made no argument. I could see he was frightened. Yes--he was different
+this last time."
+
+The detective, oblivious of the other for a moment, blew a cloud of smoke
+across the counter, causing the Jew to dodge and cough.
+
+"Let me see," Braceway said. "You saw him three months ago, two months
+ago, and three days ago. Had you ever seen him before?"
+
+Abrahamson laughed, and, reaching over, slapped Braceway on the shoulder
+gently.
+
+"You are so quick, Mr. Braceway! I can't swear I had ever seen him
+before, but I think I had--not with the gold tooth and the beard, but
+with a moustache and bushy eyebrows, eyebrows too bushy."
+
+"Where? Where did you see him?"
+
+"Here, I think--but I'm not sure, you see. Sometimes I have traveled a
+little--to Atlanta, to Washington, to New York. I don't know; I can't
+tell whether I saw him in one of those places, or some other place, or
+here."
+
+Braceway urged him with his eyes.
+
+"If you only could! Mr. Abrahamson, if you could remember where you saw
+him when he wore the moustache, you would enable me to put my hands on
+him. You'd do more. You'd give me enough information to lead to the
+arrest of the murderer."
+
+Abrahamson was silent, gazing through the shop doorway. He turned to the
+detective again.
+
+"I bet you, Mr. Braceway, you will be glad to hear something. Chief
+Greenleaf was in here this morning, asking questions. But he asked so
+many that were worth nothing, so few that were good. And I forgot to tell
+him the whole story--the things of, perhaps, significance."
+
+"Tell me. Significance is what I'm after."
+
+"Well, you know Mr. Withers spent almost the whole day in here before the
+night of the murder. Once he went out. That was in the late afternoon to
+get some lunch. While he was out--understand, while he was out--in came
+the gold-tooth fellow.
+
+"It was bad luck. I kept him as long as I could, but he was hurried,
+nervous. Half an hour, forty minutes maybe, after the gold-tooth fellow
+had gone, in came Withers again, out of breath, complaining that he had
+picked the man up just outside here and followed him, only to lose him
+when the gold-tooth fellow went through Casey's store to the avenue.
+
+"I showed Withers the ring the fellow had pawned for a hundred dollars.
+
+"'Yes, yes!' he said; 'that's one of my wife's rings.'
+
+"And he was all cut up.
+
+"Now, here is what I have to tell." Abrahamson lowered his voice and,
+leaning low on his elbow, thrust his face far over the counter toward
+Braceway. "It is only an idea, but--it is an idea. I bet you I would not
+tell anybody else. Such things might get a man into trouble. But I like
+you, Mr. Braceway. I confide in you. Mr. Withers and that man with the
+beard and the gold tooth--something in the look of the eyes, something
+in the build of the shoulders--each reminded me of the other, a little.
+And they were at no time in here together. Just an idea, I told you.
+But----"
+
+He spread out his hands, straightened his back, and smiled.
+
+Braceway was, undisguisedly, amazed.
+
+"You mean Withers was the----"
+
+"S--sh--sh!" Abrahamson held up a protesting hand. "Not so loud, Mr.
+Braceway. It is just an idea for you to think over. I study faces,
+and all that sort of thing, and ideas sometimes are valuable--sometimes
+not."
+
+"By George!" Braceway put into his expression an enthusiasm he was far
+from feeling. "You've done me a service, a tremendous service, Mr.
+Abrahamson."
+
+He thought rapidly. Three months ago! Where had George Withers been then?
+Three months ago was the first of February. He started. It was then that
+Withers had gone to Savannah. At least, he had said he was going to
+Savannah. And two months ago? He was not certain, but when had George
+left Atlanta, ostensibly for Memphis?
+
+Inwardly, the detective ridiculed himself. He would have sworn to the
+innocence of Withers. In fact, he was swearing to it all over again as
+he stood there in the pawnshop. Abrahamson's "idea" was out of the
+question. People were often victims of "wild thinking" in the midst of
+the excitement caused by a murder mystery.
+
+He returned to the effort to persuade the Jew to try to remember where he
+had seen the bearded man without a beard, with only a moustache and bushy
+eyebrows.
+
+"That's the important thing," he urged. "If you can remember that, I'll
+land the murderer."
+
+"Maybe--perhaps, I can." The pawn broker hesitated, then made up his mind
+to confide to Braceway another secret. "I don't promise, but there is a
+chance. You see, Mr. Braceway, I'm a thinker." He smiled, deprecating the
+statement. "Most men do not think. But me, I think. I do this: I want to
+remember something. Good! I go back into my little room back of the shop,
+and I practise association of ideas. What does the moustache remind me
+of? What was in his voice that made me think I had seen him before? What
+do his eyes bring up in my mind?
+
+"So! I go back over the months, over the years. One idea leads to another
+connected with it. There flash into my mind links and links of thoughts
+until I have a chain leading to--where? Somewhere. It is fun--and it
+brings the results. I will do so tonight and tomorrow. I will try. I
+bet you I will be able to tell you--finally. You see?"
+
+"It's a great scheme," said Braceway, encouraging him. "It ought to work.
+Now, tell me this: how did this fellow strike you? What did you think of
+him when he was in here pawning jewels and wearing a disguise?"
+
+"I will tell you the truth. I thought at first he was like a lot of other
+sick people who come here with that disease--tuberculosis. In the
+beginning they have plenty of money. They expect to get well before the
+money gives out. But they have miscalculated. They are not yet well, and
+the money is gone.
+
+"What next? They must have more money. With this disease, the rich get
+well, the poor die. Well! I thought this fellow needed money to get
+well--that was all; and, like a lot of them, he was ashamed of being hard
+up and didn't want it known."
+
+"Tell me this: would the ordinary man in the street have noticed that the
+gold tooth was a false, clumsy affair?"
+
+"I think not. I buy all sorts of old gold and sets of false teeth. There
+is a market for them. I have studied them. That's why I saw what this
+fellow's was."
+
+"I see. Now, will you show me what he pawned two months ago, and three
+months ago?"
+
+Abrahamson consulted a big book, went to the safe at the back of the
+shop, and returned with two little packets. In the first were two
+bracelets, one studded with emeralds and diamonds, the other set with
+rubies. In the second envelope was a gold ring set with one large diamond
+surrounded by small rubies.
+
+"I allowed him six hundred dollars on the bracelets," explained
+Abrahamson; "they are handsome--exquisite; and three hundred and fifty
+on the ring."
+
+Braceway passed the stuff back to him. It was a part of the Withers
+jewelry.
+
+"You see, Mr. Braceway," added the Jew, "all this business, this murder
+and everything, will cost me money. This jewelry, it is stolen goods.
+Chief Greenleaf leaves it here for the present, as a decoy. Perhaps,
+somebody might try to reclaim it. That's what he thinks. As for me, I
+don't think so. It is a dead loss."
+
+He sighed and rearranged the articles in their envelopes.
+
+"Yes," agreed the detective; "it's hard luck. You've got every reason to
+be interested in running down the truth in this mix-up. I wish you could
+tell me where you think you saw this man--the time he had neither the
+gold tooth nor the brown beard."
+
+"Be patient, my friend--Mr. Braceway. By tomorrow I may remember. I shall
+work hard--the association of ideas! It is a great system."
+
+Braceway thanked him and was about to leave the shop. He had already
+formed a new plan. He turned back to the pawn broker.
+
+"By the way," he said, "I'm going to Washington tomorrow. If you should
+remember, if the association of ideas produces anything, I wonder if
+you'd wire me?"
+
+"Certainly. Certainly."
+
+The detective wrote on a slip of paper: S. S. Braceway, Willard Hotel. He
+handed it to Abrahamson.
+
+"Wire me that address, collect," he directed.
+
+Abrahamson promised, smiling. He was pleased with the idea of helping to
+solve the problem which convulsed Furmville.
+
+"Oh," added Braceway, "another thing. How would you describe this fellow
+in addition to the fact that he wore the beard and the gold tooth?"
+
+"Very thin lips," replied Abrahamson slowly, "and high, straight,
+aquiline nose, and blond hair, and--and, I should say, rather thin, high
+voice."
+
+"Good!" Braceway exclaimed. "Good! Mr. Abrahamson, you've just described
+the man who, I believe, committed the murder. And I know where he is."
+
+Morley had been pointed out to him in the hotel earlier in the day, and
+Abrahamson's memory sketched a fairly good likeness of the young man as
+he remembered him. Why not make certain of it at once?
+
+"You've been very obliging," he continued, "and, I suppose, that's why I
+feel I can impose on you further. I confide in you, as you did in me. I'm
+going back to the Brevord now. Could you follow me and take a look at a
+man who'll be with me there?"
+
+The Jew's eyes sparkled.
+
+"Yes, Mr. Braceway," he said and added: "It may cost me money, closing up
+the shop, you understand. But if I can help----"
+
+"Don't misunderstand me," the detective cautioned. "There's no charge of
+murder. Nothing like that. This fellow may be the gold-tooth man, and
+still not be the guilty man."
+
+"I see; I see," Abrahamson's tone was one of importance. "You go on, Mr.
+Braceway. I'll follow in three minutes."
+
+"If the man I'm with is the one who wore the disguise, if he looks more
+like it than Mr. Withers did, make no sign. If he's not the fellow
+communicate with me later--as soon as you can."
+
+Morley was the first person Braceway saw when he entered the lobby of the
+hotel. He lost no time, but crossed over to the leather settee on which
+the young man sat. Morley looked haggard and frightened, and, although he
+held a newspaper in front of him, was gazing into space.
+
+Braceway decided to "take a chance." He had a great respect for his
+intuitions. These "hunches," he had found, were sometimes of no value,
+but they had helped him often enough to make the ideas that came to him
+in this way worth trying. He introduced himself.
+
+"I was wondering," he said, sitting down beside Morley, "if you couldn't
+help me out in a little matter."
+
+Morley sighed and put down his paper before he answered:
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Something about make-ups--facial make-up."
+
+Morley looked at him and felt that the detective's eyes bored into him.
+
+"What about make-up?"
+
+"I had the idea--perhaps I got it from George Withers--that you used to
+be interested in a matter of theatricals."
+
+Morley coloured.
+
+"Yes. That is," he qualified, "I was a member of the dramatic club when
+I was in college, University of Pennsylvania. But I didn't know Withers
+knew anything about it."
+
+Braceway's demeanour now was casual. His eyes were no longer on Morley.
+He was watching Abrahamson, who was at the news-stand near the main
+entrance.
+
+"I thought George had mentioned it to me, but I may be mistaken. Did you
+ever 'make up' with a beard?"
+
+The morning papers had got hold of the suspicion of some of the
+authorities that a man wearing a brown beard and a gold tooth was wanted
+because of the murder of Mrs. Withers. Although Chief Greenleaf had tried
+to keep it quiet, it had leaked out as a result of Jenkins' search for
+traces of the man. Morley had read all this, and Braceway's question
+upset him.
+
+"No," he answered; "I never did. I played women's parts."
+
+Abrahamson was shaking his head in negation. He made it plain that he saw
+in Morley no resemblance to the man who had come disguised to the
+pawnshop.
+
+Braceway did not press Morley for further information.
+
+"Then you can't help me," he laughed lightly. "Women don't wear beards."
+
+He got up with a careless word about the hot weather and passed on to the
+clerk's desk. He was thinking: "He was lying. Any college annual prints
+the cast of the important 'show' given by the dramatic club that year.
+I'll wire Philadelphia."
+
+He found the manager of the Brevord and inquired:
+
+"How about the bellboy who was on duty all Monday night, Mr. Keene?"
+
+"He's in the house now," Keene informed him. "Roddy is his name."
+
+"Send him up to my room, will you?"
+
+Braceway stepped into the elevator. Five minutes after he had
+disappeared, Morley went into the writing room. His hand trembled a
+little as he picked up a pen. He put two or three lines on several sheets
+of paper, one after the other, and tore up all of them.
+
+The communication which he finally completed he put into an envelope and
+addressed to Braceway. It read:
+
+  "Dear Mr. Braceway: When you asked me about the make-up, I was thinking
+  of something else and was not quite clear as to what you were saying or
+  what you wanted to know. I remember now that, on one occasion, I did
+  have a part as a man who wore a beard in a play given by my college
+  dramatic club. However, I don't remember enough about it to pass as an
+  expert on such make-ups.
+
+  "Yours truly,
+
+  "Henry Morley."
+
+Going to the desk, he left the note for the detective.
+
+"I'm a fool," he reflected, as he went to the door and looked out at the
+traffic in the street. "I believe I'll get a lawyer."
+
+He considered this for a while.
+
+"Oh, what's the use? He'll ask me a lot of questions, and----"
+
+He shuddered and turned back into the lobby, hesitant and wretched.
+
+"My God!" he thought miserably. "I've got to get back to Washington! I've
+got to! After that, I can think--think!"
+
+But he believed he could not go until the chief of police gave him
+permission. If he had consulted a lawyer, he might have found out
+differently. As it was, he stayed on, thinking more and more
+disconnectedly, eating nothing, his nerves wearing to raw ends.
+
+Upstairs Braceway was strengthening the net he had already woven around
+Henry Morley.
+
+"I was right." He reviewed what he had learned from Abrahamson. "It's
+still up to Morley. That pawn broker's off, 'way off. He thinks George
+Withers resembles the man with the beard, and, although he gave me the
+description that fitted Morley exactly, he takes a look at him and denies
+emphatically that Morley resembles at all the fellow with the disguise."
+
+Abrahamson, however, was not satisfied with what he had seen. Back in
+front of his shop, he opened the door, took down the sign he had left
+hanging on the knob, "Back in ten minutes," substituted another, "Closed
+for the day," relocked the door, and started off in the direction of
+Casey's department store.
+
+He had decided to devote the whole afternoon to detective work. Of
+course, it would cost him money, having the shop closed half a day.
+"But," he consoled himself, "I'm worth seventy thousand dollars. I bet
+I am entitled to a little holiday."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+BRACEWAY SEES A LIGHT
+
+
+Braceway had discovered long ago that the man who attempts good work as a
+detective must depend almost as much on his ability to make friends as he
+does on his capacity for sifting evidence.
+
+"I'm a good worker," he was in the habit of saying, "but I'm not half as
+good working alone as I am when I have the help of all the men and women
+who are witnesses in a case or connected with it in some other way. I
+need all the cooperation I can get."
+
+This was one reason why Roddy, when he entered Braceway's room, felt sure
+immediately that he would receive only kindly treatment. He had shown
+signs of fear on entering the room, and in his extremely black face his
+singularly white eyeballs had rolled around grotesquely.
+
+But Braceway put him at ease with a smile.
+
+"What have you been trying to do, Roddy?" was his first good-humoured
+question. "Think you've got sense enough to fool all the white folks?"
+
+"Who, boss? Me, boss?" the boy returned, disavowing with a grin any
+pretense to intelligence. "Naw, suh, boss. You knows I ain' got no sense.
+I ain' nevuh tried to fool nobody."
+
+"Didn't you tell the chief of police you were awake all of Monday night
+when you were on duty in the lobby and didn't you say the only thing you
+did was to carry up Mr. Morley's bags?"
+
+"Yas, suh, boss; an' dat was de truth--nothin' but de truth, boss. Gawd
+knows----"
+
+Braceway took from his pocket a crisp, new one-dollar bill and smoothed
+it out on his knee.
+
+"Now, listen to me, Roddy," he said, this time unsmiling. "Mr. Keene has
+just told me he wouldn't fire you, even if you did go to sleep Monday
+night. There's nothing for you to be afraid of; and this dollar note is
+yours as soon as you tell me the truth, the real truth, about what you
+saw and what you missed seeing Monday night. If you don't tell me, I'll
+have you arrested."
+
+Roddy's eyes, which had shone with a rather greasy glitter at the sight
+of the money, rolled rapidly and whitely in their sockets at the mention
+of arrest.
+
+"'Deed, boss, you ain' gwine to have no cause to 'res' me, no cause
+whatsomever. You knows how 'tis, boss. Us coloured folks, we got a gif,
+jes' a natchel gif', foh nappin' an' sleepin'. Boss, dar ain' no nigger
+in dis town whut would have kep' wide awake--_wide_--all dat Monday night
+nor any yuther night."
+
+"Very well. Think now. Try to remember. Were you asleep at all before
+midnight?"
+
+"Naw, suh, boss. Naw, suh!"
+
+"Not at all?"
+
+Roddy began to wilt again.
+
+"Well, it might uv been dis way, boss, possibilly. 'Long 'bout 'leven I
+kinder remembuhs jes' a sort uv nap, mo' like a slip, boss." He coughed
+and spoke desperately: "You see, boss, when it gits a little quiet at
+night, seems to me, why, right den, ev'y nigger I knows is got a hinge in
+his neck. 'Pears like he jes' gotter let his haid drap furward. Dar ain'
+no use talkin', boss, dat hinge wuks ovuhtime. I 'spec' mine done it,
+too, jes' like you say, 'long 'bout 'leven. Yas, suh, I reckon dat's
+right."
+
+"How about the time between midnight and two in the morning? Was the
+hinge working then?"
+
+"Aw, boss," replied Roddy with something like reproach, "you knows 'tain'
+no queshun uv a hinge arftuh midnight. Arftuh midnight, boss, de screws
+drap right outen' de hinge, an' dar ain' no mo' hinge. You jes' natchelly
+keeps your haid down an' don' lif' it no mo'. Naw, suh, dar ain' no hinge
+to he'p you dat late, _on_less--_on_less somebody hit you or stab you."
+
+Braceway became stern. His eyes snapped.
+
+"Didn't you carry Mr. Morley's grips up to his room for him that night,
+room number four hundred and twenty-one?"
+
+"Yas, suh."
+
+"What time was that?"
+
+"Dat wuz jes' five minutes arftuh two, boss."
+
+"Had you been asleep during the two hours before that?"
+
+"I hates to say it, boss, but I wuz, almos' completely."
+
+"Then, how did you wake yourself up thoroughly enough to know that it was
+exactly five minutes past two?"
+
+"Lemme see, suh. Possibilly, 'twuz bekase uv whut I seen 'long about
+ha'fpas' one--possibilly, boss."
+
+"So you hadn't been asleep for two hours?"
+
+"Almos', suh. It wuz dis way: you see, boss, de bellboys' bench is right
+unduh de big clock in de lobby, off to de right uv de desk. I happen' dat
+night to let my haid slide ovuh 'g'in de glass case uv de clock, an when
+it stahted out to hit de ha'fpas' bell, it rattled an' whizzed, an' it
+jarred me. Golly, boss! I woke up an', when I seed how it wuz rainin'
+outside, I thought lightnin' had hit me. It skeered me--an' dat is one
+good way to wake up a nigger at night--skeer 'im, an' you don' have to
+stab him. I sorter hollered.
+
+"I got up an' went to de main entrance, jes' to make de night clerk think
+I wuz on de job in case he woke up. I looked down de street tow'rd de
+post-office, an' I seed a man goin' in dar.
+
+"'Bless de Lawd!' I says to myse'f. 'White people ain' got much to
+do--goin' to de post-office dis time uv night.' An' I went on back to de
+bellboys' bench and stahted in niggerin' it once mo'e."
+
+"Niggering it?"
+
+"Yas, boss; you know, dat means quick sleepin'. 'Peared to me I ain' no
+mo'e got my eyes shut when I wakes up ag'in, an' right dar in de lobby is
+dat same man what I seed gwine to de post-office."
+
+"What waked you up?"
+
+"I don' know, boss. I can' no mo'e figger dat out den I kin fly. Dat wuz
+de fust time in my life dat I done wake up at night when onmolested."
+
+"How did you know the man you saw in the lobby was the one you had seen
+going into the post-office?"
+
+"Dey wuz de same, boss; dat's all. Had de same buil', same long raincoat
+on, an' same thick beard. He had done pass' me by an' wuz on his way up
+de stairs 'stead uv waitin' foh me to run de elevatuh. I wouldn' nevuh
+seed his beard dat time, but he turn' 'roun' when he wuz nigh to de top
+uv de stairs an' look back at me. Den I seed foh a fac' dat he wuz de
+same as de yuther man I jes' done seed."
+
+Braceway gave no sign of how highly he valued the negro's words. Seated
+by the window, the dollar bill still on his knee, he kept his gaze on
+Roddy, holding him to his narrative.
+
+"You want me to believe that, when you saw this man two blocks away at
+half-past one in the morning, you noticed he wore a beard? Wasn't it
+too dark?"
+
+"Naw, suh. Dem post-office lights is pow'ful, boss. I seed de beard all
+right, an' I seed it once mo'e when he wuz on de stairs."
+
+"What did he do after he had looked back at you while he was going
+upstairs?"
+
+"Nothin', boss. He seed I wuz lookin' at him, an' he jes' went on up an'
+out uv sight, in a hurry, like."
+
+"What time was that?"
+
+"Dat wuz twenty-six minutes uv two."
+
+"How do you know that? You'd gone back to sleep, hadn't you?"
+
+"Yas, suh, a little niggerin'. But, when I woke up dat way widout no
+reason, I kinder jumped. I wuz afeer'd dat clock might be goin' to jar me
+ag'in, an' I took a look at it. Dat wuz how I seed de time. It wuz
+twenty-six minutes uv two."
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"Nothin', boss; jes' went on niggerin' it. Dat is, I went on till de
+night clerk giv' me a kick on de shins and tole me to take Mistuh
+Morley's bags up to fo'-twenty-one. I done tole you dat was five minutes
+arftuh two. Den, when we got up to de room, I says to him: 'I thought you
+wuz in dis hotel half-hour ago, boss, when you had a beard.'
+
+"An' right off de bat I wuz sorry I said dat. He look' at me kinder mad
+an' he said: 'Whut you talkin' 'bout, boy? You mus' be talkin' in yore
+sleep!'
+
+"I come on back downstairs. He didn' have to say no mo'e. I tell you,
+boss, when a white man tell me I been talkin' in my sleep, I _is_ been
+talkin' in my sleep--dar ain' no argufyin' 'bout it--I _is_ been doin'
+dat ve'y thing."
+
+"But you thought Mr. Morley, the man with the grips, was the one you had
+seen going up the stairs and, also, the one you had seen going into the
+post-office--and, when you saw him on the stairs and on the street, he
+wore a beard? Is that it?"
+
+"I ain' thought nothin' 'bout it, boss. I knowed it."
+
+"What did you think about his shaving off the beard at that time in the
+morning?" Braceway urged, fingering the dollar bill. "Didn't you think
+it was queer?"
+
+"I tryin' to tell you, suh, I ain' done no thinkin' 'bout dat. He done
+said I wuz talkin' in my sleep, an' I is a prudent nigger."
+
+"Did he have a gold tooth, Roddy?"
+
+"Naw, suh," said Roddy, "but he did look rich 'nough to have one.
+Leastways I ain' seen he had one."
+
+"Have you seen the man with the beard since?"
+
+"Naw, suh. I jes' tole you, boss, he done shave it off."
+
+"And Mr. Morley?"
+
+"Yas, suh, I done seen him. He's in de hotel now. He's de same man."
+
+"Did he wear rubber overshoes when he had the beard, and when he didn't
+have it?"
+
+"Yas, suh--bofe times."
+
+"Has he said anything to you since Monday night?"
+
+"Naw, suh."
+
+"Did you see anybody else that night--Monday night?"
+
+"Naw, suh."
+
+"Do you remember anything else about how the bearded man looked?"
+
+"Naw, suh, 'cep' he look' jes' like dis Mistuh Morley; dat's all I know,
+boss."
+
+Braceway got to his feet.
+
+"All right, Roddy," he said heartily; "you're a good boy. Here's your
+dollar."
+
+Roddy rolled his white eyeballs toward the ceiling and bent his black
+face floorward.
+
+"Gawd bless you, boss! You is one good----"
+
+"And here's another dollar, if you can keep your mouth shut about this
+until I tell you to open it. Can you do that?"
+
+Roddy conveyed the assurance of his ability to remain dumb until a
+considerable time after the sounding of Gabriel's trump.
+
+"See that you do. If you don't, I might have to arrest you after all."
+
+When the negro had gone, Braceway stood at the window and, with glance
+turned toward the street, saw nothing of what was passing there. He was
+reviewing the facts--or possible facts--that had just come to him.
+Restlessness took hold of him. He fell to pacing the length of the room
+with long, quick strides. It seemed that, in the labour of forcing his
+brain to its highest activity, he called on every fibre and muscle of his
+physique. His cheeks were flushed; his eyes, hard and brilliant, snapped.
+
+He was thinking--thinking, going over every particle of the evidence he
+had drawn from Roddy, trying to estimate its value when compared with
+everything else he had learned about the case. His stride grew more
+rapid; his breathing was faster.
+
+The murder, the men and women connected with it, the stories they had
+told, all these flashed on the screen of his mind and hung there until he
+had judged them to their smallest detail.
+
+What could Abrahamson have meant by indicating a belief that the man with
+the gold tooth looked like George Withers?
+
+Was the boy Roddy wide enough awake that night to have formed any real
+opinion as to the resemblance of the bearded man and Henry Morley?
+
+The trip to the post-office--did that explain the disappearance of the
+stolen jewelry? Had Morley mailed it at once to himself, or somebody
+else, in Washington?
+
+Withers had returned to the Brevord early Monday night. That must have
+been before half-past twelve. Although the night clerk and the bellboy
+had been asleep at the time and had not seen him, there was no room for
+doubt of his return as he had described it.
+
+And why should Morley, wearing the disguise, have waked up Roddy and
+assured himself, by the look flung over his shoulder, that the negro saw
+him on the stairs?
+
+Or had that been Morley, after all? What reason, what motive----
+
+Suddenly, with the abruptness of a horse thrown back on his haunches, he
+stood stock still in the middle of the room, his brilliant eyes staring
+at the wall, his breathing faster than ever, as he considered the idea
+that had flashed upon him. The idea grew into a theory. It had never
+occurred to him before, and yet it was right. It must be. He had it! For
+the first time, he felt sure of himself, was convinced that he held a
+safe grasp on the case.
+
+He strode to the window and struck the sill with his fist. The tenseness
+went out of his body. He breathed a long sigh of relief. He had seen
+through the mist of puzzling facts and contradictory clues. The rest
+would be comparatively plain sailing.
+
+Some of Braceway's friends were in the habit of laughing at him because,
+when he was sure of having solved a criminal puzzle, he always could
+be seen carrying a cane. The appearance of the cane invariably foretold
+the arrest of a guilty man.
+
+He went now to the corner near the bureau and picked up the light
+walking-stick he had brought to Furmville strapped to his suitcase. He
+lingered, twirling the cane in his right hand. His thoughts went to the
+interview he and Bristow had had that morning with Fulton, whose white
+hair and deep-lined face were very clear before him. He recalled the old
+man's words:
+
+"She wept bitterly. I can hear her weeping now. She had a dash, a spirit,
+a joyous soul. This man none of you has been able to find has been in
+Enid's life for a good many years."
+
+Braceway's eyes softened.
+
+Well, there was no need to worry now. Things were coming his way. The old
+man would have his revenge. He put on his hat, deciding to go down for a
+late lunch. When he looked at his watch, he whistled. He had promised to
+be at the railroad station to see the funeral party off for Atlanta on
+the four o'clock train; and it was now half-past three. He hurried out.
+
+For the first time in his life, he had been guilty of taking a course
+which might lead to serious results, or to no results at all. He had
+permitted personal considerations to make "blind spots" in his brain.
+
+Because of a warm friendship for George Withers, he had rushed to
+conclusions which took no account of the dead woman's husband. He had
+forgotten that the faces of Morley and Withers were shaped on similar
+lines. If any other detective had done that, Braceway would have been the
+first to censure him.
+
+As he had expected, he found Withers and Mr. Fulton far ahead of train
+time. They had been passed through the gates and were standing on the
+platform. Braceway noticed that, of the two, the father was standing the
+ordeal with greater fortitude and calmness. Withers was nervous,
+fidgety, and seemed to find it impossible to stand in any one place. He
+drew Braceway to one side.
+
+"I've got something to tell you, Brace," he said in a low tone, his voice
+tremulous. "I didn't want to tell you for--for her sake. I thought it
+might cause useless talk, scandal. But you're working your head off for
+me, and you've a right to know about it."
+
+"Don't worry, George," Braceway reassured him. "Things are coming out all
+right. Don't talk if you don't feel like it."
+
+He said this because he was suddenly aware of the quality of suffering
+he saw in the man's eyes. It was so evident, so striking, that he felt
+surprised. Perhaps, he thought, he might have exaggerated things when he
+had told Bristow that Enid had subjected her husband to incessant
+disappointments and regrets. Withers now was mourning; in fact, he
+appeared overwhelmed, crushed.
+
+"It's this," Withers hurried on: "I was up there that night in front of
+the house until--until after one o'clock. You know I told you I was on
+the porch just across the road and went back to the hotel as soon as
+Campbell had turned his machine and gone home. That wasn't quite correct.
+I waited, because Enid didn't turn out the lights in the living room. It
+struck me as strange.
+
+"I waited, and I fell asleep. That seems funny--a husband infuriated with
+his wife and trying to find out what she is doing to deceive him goes
+to sleep while he's watching! But that's exactly what I did.
+
+"When I awoke, the lights were still on in the living room. I looked at
+my watch, and, although I couldn't see very well, I made out it was after
+one. I suppose I'd been asleep for half an hour at least. You see, I had
+had a hard night on the sleeper and a terrific day, and----"
+
+"Sure. I understand that," Braceway consoled him. "Did you see anything,
+George?"
+
+"Yes; I saw something all right," he struggled with the words. "As I
+looked up, a figure was silhouetted against the yellow window shade. It
+was a man's figure. It was after one in the morning, and a man was there
+with----"
+
+His voice failed him altogether. Braceway, a perplexed look in his eyes,
+studied him uneasily.
+
+"The silhouette was quite plain. There was the clear-cut shadow of him
+from the waist up. It was so plain that I could see he was wearing
+a cap. I could see the visor of it, you know; a long visor. He was a
+well-built man, good shoulders, and so on.
+
+"As I got to my feet, the lights were turned off. I went across the
+street. I don't think I ran. It was raining. I was going to kill him.
+That was all I was thinking about. I was going to kill him, and I wanted
+to catch him unawares. I wasn't armed, and I was going to choke him to
+death."
+
+The train gates were opened, and passengers began to stream past them
+toward the train. Withers lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper. Braceway
+noticed the unpleasant sound of it.
+
+"He did what I expected; came down the steps without a sound. I didn't
+even hear him close the door. I can't say I saw him. It was pitch dark,
+and I sensed where he was. I was conscious of all his movements. When he
+reached the bottom step, I closed with him. I couldn't trust to hitting
+at him. It was too dark.
+
+"I put out my hands to get his throat, but I misjudged things. I caught
+him by the waist. He had on a raincoat. I could tell it by the feel of
+the cloth. And I couldn't get a good hold of him. While I struggled with
+him, he got me by the throat. He was a powerful man, a dozen times
+stronger than I am.
+
+"We swayed around there for a few minutes, a few seconds--I don't know
+which. We didn't make any noise. I couldn't do a thing. He choked me
+until I thought my head would burst open.
+
+"When he realized I was all in, he gave me a shove that made me reel down
+the walk a dozen steps. He didn't stop to see what I did. He ran. That
+is, I suppose he ran. I didn't hear him, and I didn't see him again. He
+disappeared--completely."
+
+Braceway looked at his watch. It was five minutes before train time.
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"Where did you go, then? What did you think? Speed up, George! I want to
+get all this before you go."
+
+"Yes," said Withers, a little catch in his throat; "I thought you ought
+to know about it. I--I stood there a moment, there in the rain, dazed,
+trying to get my breath. I'd intended going in to have it out with Enid.
+But I didn't. I suppose I knew, if I did, I'd kill her. And I guess now
+I would have.
+
+"You see, I hadn't the faintest notion that anything had happened to her;
+had hurt her, I mean. I got myself in hand. I didn't do anything. I went
+back to the hotel. I planned to have a last talk with her later in the
+day."
+
+"Tell me," Braceway asked with undisguised eagerness, "did this man wear
+a beard?"
+
+"I think so. I've been thinking about that all day. I think he did, but
+I'm not sure."
+
+"But you saw the plain silhouette, the outline of his head and body!"
+
+"Yes. He might have had a beard, and again he might not. He was heavily
+built, with a short, thick neck, and, in the attitude he was in,
+foreshortened by the light being above him, a strong chin might have
+been magnified, might have cast a shadow like that of a beard."
+
+"And when you were struggling with him? How about that? Didn't you get
+close to his face?"
+
+"Yes; but he was taller than I was--I don't know--I can't remember. But I
+think he had the beard, all right."
+
+"He didn't make any noise on the steps, you say. Did he have rubber
+shoes?"
+
+"I don't know. My guess would be that he did."
+
+The conductor began to shout, "All aboard!"
+
+They started toward the Atlanta pullman.
+
+"I wouldn't have told you--I can't see that any of this could affect the
+final result--but for the fact that something might have come up to
+embarrass you," Withers explained, still with the unpleasant, rattling
+whisper. "It might have led you to think I hadn't been frank with you."
+
+He had his foot on the first step of the car. The porter was evidently
+anxious to get aboard and close the vestibule door.
+
+"What do you mean?" Braceway caught him by the sleeve.
+
+"Somehow," Withers leaned down to whisper, "in the struggle, I think, I
+dropped--I lost my watch. Somebody must have picked it up, you know."
+
+"Damn!" exploded Braceway angrily. "Why didn't----"
+
+The train began to move. The porter put his hand to Withers' elbow and
+hurried him up the steps.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A MESSAGE FROM MISS FULTON
+
+
+It was a little after three o'clock when Chief Greenleaf and Lawrence
+Bristow finished their "celebration dinner" and took their seats on the
+porch of No. 9. The host, accomplishing the impossible in a prohibition
+state, had produced a bottle of champagne, explaining: "Just for you,
+chief; I never touch it;" and the chief had enjoyed it, unmistakably.
+
+At Bristow's suggestion they refrained from discussing any phase of the
+murder during the meal.
+
+"All we have to do now," he said, "is to see that the knot in Perry's
+rope is artistically tied--and that's not appetizing."
+
+"I've got something new," Greenleaf contributed; "but you're right. We'll
+wait until after dinner."
+
+They were greatly pleased with what they had accomplished; and each one,
+without giving it voice, knew the other's pleasure was increased by the
+thought that they had got the better of Braceway.
+
+They saw from the porch that an automobile was standing in front of
+No. 5. As they settled back in their chairs, Fulton and George Withers
+left the bungalow and got into the machine.
+
+"They're going to take the body to Atlanta on the four o'clock," said
+Greenleaf.
+
+For a moment they watched the receding automobile. Then Bristow inquired,
+"What's the new thing you've dug up?"
+
+"The report from the Charlotte laboratories."
+
+"Oh, you got that--by wire?"
+
+The lame man seemed indifferent about it.
+
+"Yes; by wire," Greenleaf paused, as if he enjoyed whetting the other's
+curiosity.
+
+Bristow made no comment. He gave the impression of being confident that
+the report could contain nothing of value.
+
+"You ain't very anxious to know what it is," the chief complained. "I
+nearly had a fit until it came."
+
+"Oh, it doesn't matter much, one way or the other," Bristow said,
+conscious of Greenleaf's petulance. "The thing's settled anyway."
+
+"That may be true; but it don't do any harm to get everything we can. The
+laboratory reported what you thought they'd report. Nothing under Miss
+Fulton's nails; particles of a white person's skin, epidermis, under
+Perry's."
+
+Bristow laughed pleasantly, his eyes suddenly more alight.
+
+"I beg your pardon, chief; I was having a little fun with you--by
+pretending indifference. But it's great--better than I'd really dared
+expect. It's the only direct, first-hand evidence we can offer showing
+that the negro, beyond any dispute, did attack her."
+
+He laughed again. "Let's see the wire."
+
+"I guess it settles the whole business," Greenleaf exulted, passing him
+the telegram.
+
+He read it and handed it back.
+
+"After that," he commented, "I'm almost tempted to throw away what I had
+to show you; its importance dwindles."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"A confession by Lucy Thomas that Perry went to Number Five the night,
+rather the morning, of the murder."
+
+"You got that--from her!" exclaimed Greenleaf.
+
+"Yes--signed."
+
+"Mr. Bristow, you're a wonder! By cripes, you are! My men couldn't get
+anything out of her. Neither could I."
+
+"Here it is. I wrote out her story and read it back to her, and she
+signed it."
+
+Greenleaf took the paper and read it:
+
+  "I know Perry Carpenter went to Mrs. Withers' house Monday night. He
+   and I had been drinking together, and I was nearly drunk, but he was
+   only about half-drunk. He told me he knew where he could get a lot of
+   money, or 'something just as good as money,' because he had seen 'that
+   white woman' with it. He and I had a fight because he wanted me to
+   give him the key to Mrs. Withers' house, to her kitchen door.
+
+  "He broke the ribbon on which I used to hang the key around my neck,
+   and he went out. That was pretty late in the night. Before daylight,
+   he came back and flung the key on the floor, and he cursed me and hit
+   me. I had two keys on the ribbon, one to Number Five, Manniston Road,
+   and one to the house where I worked before I went to Mrs. Withers. He
+   had taken the wrong one. When he hit me, he said: 'You think you're
+   damn smart, giving me the wrong key; but that didn't stop me.' He
+   seemed to be drunker then than he was when he went out earlier in the
+   night.
+
+  (Signed) "Lucy Thomas."
+
+The chief whistled. "How in thunder did you get this out of the woman?"
+
+"Sent for her and had a talk with her. She told so many stories and
+contradicted herself so much that, at last, she broke down and let me
+have the real facts."
+
+"Will she stick to what she says in this paper?"
+
+"Oh, yes. There won't be any trouble about that."
+
+Greenleaf offered him the signed confession.
+
+"No; keep it," he said. "It's your property, not mine."
+
+The chief folded it and put it carefully into his breast pocket.
+
+"I wonder," he speculated, "what Mr. Braceway will say to this."
+
+"He'll realize that the case is settled. But I don't think he'll quit
+work."
+
+"Why won't he, if he sees we've got the guilty man?"
+
+"That's what I'd like to know. I believe--this is between you and me--I
+believe he's working more for George Withers now than he is for the
+state. You see, as I've already told you, there may be some family
+scandal in this, something the husband wants to keep quiet. Braceway will
+be satisfied as soon as we show him that the only thing we want is to
+present the evidence against the negro; that we take no interest in
+private scandals. But there's one thing, however, chief, I wish you'd do:
+let Morley go to Washington on the midnight train tonight instead of
+making him wait until tomorrow."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"If Braceway won't let matters drop as they are now, he'll insist on
+following Morley to Washington. If he does, I'm going, too; and we might
+as well get it over."
+
+"You're not afraid our case won't hold water, are you?"
+
+"No. The case stands on its own feet. There's no power on earth that
+could break it down."
+
+"Well, then, why----"
+
+"I'll tell you why, chief. I've been set down here with this
+tuberculosis. You know what that means, at least, several years of
+convalescence. Why shouldn't I make use of those years, develop a
+business in which I can engage while I'm here? This murder case has
+opened the door for me, and I'm going to take advantage of it. Lawrence
+Bristow, consulting detective and criminologist. How does that strike
+you?"
+
+"Fine!" said Greenleaf heartily. "And you're right. Your reputation's
+made; and, even if you had to be away from Furmville a few days at a time
+now and then, it wouldn't hurt your health."
+
+The chief's tendency to claim credit for Carpenter's arrest had
+disappeared. He liked Bristow, was impressed by his quiet effectiveness.
+
+"I'm glad you think I can get away with it," the lame man said, much
+pleased. "Now, you see why I want to go to Washington with Braceway. It's
+merely to keep my hold on this case. If you say I'm entitled to the
+credit for reading the riddle, I'm going to see that I get the credit."
+
+"All right. I'll let Morley know he can go tonight, and he needn't worry
+about our troubling him."
+
+"Thanks. The sooner we gather up every little strand of evidence, the
+better it will be."
+
+Greenleaf prepared to leave. As he stood up, he caught sight of a young
+man coming up Manniston Road.
+
+"A stranger," he announced. "Another detective?"
+
+Bristow glanced down the street.
+
+"No. It's a newspaper correspondent. That's my guess. The Washington and
+New York papers have had time to send special men here by now for feature
+stories."
+
+The young man went briskly up the steps of No. 5.
+
+"I was right," concluded Bristow. "If you run into him, chief, do the
+talking for the two of us. Just tell him I refuse to be interviewed."
+
+"Why?" demanded Greenleaf. "An interview would give you good
+advertising."
+
+"There's just one sort of publicity that's better than talking," said
+Bristow laconically; "aloofness, mystery. It makes people wonder, keeps
+them talking."
+
+It happened as Bristow had thought. Greenleaf, going down the walk, met
+the stranger, special correspondent of a New York paper. They had a short
+colloquy, the newspaper man looking frequently toward No. 9, and finally
+they turned and went down Manniston Road.
+
+Bristow, leaving his chair to go back to the sleeping porch, saw Miss
+Kelly come out of No. 5 and hurry in his direction. He waited for her.
+
+"Miss Fulton wants to see you, Mr. Bristow," said the nurse. "She asked
+me to tell you it's very important."
+
+He was frankly surprised.
+
+"Wants to see me, Miss Kelly?"
+
+"Yes; at once, if you can come."
+
+"Why, certainly."
+
+He stepped into the house and got his hat.
+
+"How is Miss Fulton?" he inquired, descending the steps with Miss Kelly.
+
+"Much better. In fact, she seemed in good spirits and fairly strong as
+soon as her father and Mr. Withers left. That was about half an hour
+ago."
+
+"Perhaps, their departure helped her," he suggested, smiling. "Often
+one's family is annoying--we may love them, but we want them at a lovable
+distance."
+
+She gave him an approving smile.
+
+"What about the medicine?" he asked as they reached the door. "Has she
+had much bromide--stuff like that?"
+
+"No; not today. Her mind's perfectly clear."
+
+He put one more question:
+
+"Do you happen to know why she wishes to see me?"
+
+"I think it's something about her brother-in-law, Mr. Withers."
+
+"Ah! I wonder whether----"
+
+He did not finish the sentence, but, stepping into the living room,
+waited for Miss Kelly to announce his arrival.
+
+The quick mechanism of his mind informed him that he was about to be
+confronted with some totally unexpected situation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+MISS FULTON'S REVELATION
+
+
+Prepared as he was for surprise, his emotion, when he was ushered into
+Miss Fulton's room, was little short of amazement. The girl was
+transformed. Instead of a spoiled child, with petulant expression, he
+beheld a calm, well controlled woman who greeted him cordially with a
+smile. Overnight, it seemed, she had developed into maturity.
+
+Wearing a simple, pale blue negligée, and propped up in bed, as she had
+been the day before, she had now in her attitude nothing of the weakness
+she had shown during his former interview with her. For the first time,
+he saw that she was a handsome woman, and it was no longer hard for him
+to realize why Braceway had been in love with her. He waited for her to
+explain why he had been summoned.
+
+"I've taken affairs into my own hands--that is, my affairs," she said.
+"There's something you should know."
+
+"If there is anything----" he began the polite formula.
+
+"First," she told him, "I'd better explain that father ordered me to
+discuss the--my sister's death with nobody except Judge Rogers. You know
+who he is, the attorney here. Father and George have retained him. I
+haven't seen him yet. I wanted to give you certain facts. I know you'll
+make the just, proper use of them."
+
+"Then I was right? You do know----"
+
+"Yes," she said, exhibiting, so far as he could observe, no excitement
+whatever; "I was not asleep the whole of Monday night. I narrowly escaped
+seeing my sister die--seeing her murdered."
+
+Her lips trembled momentarily, but she took hold of herself remarkably. A
+trifle incredulous, he watched her closely.
+
+"I heard a noise in the living room. It wasn't a loud noise. The fact
+that it was guarded, or cautious, waked me up, I think. Before I got out
+of bed, I looked at my watch. It was somewhere in the neighbourhood of
+one o'clock--I'm not sure how many minutes after one. As I reached the
+little hallway opening into the dining room, I heard a man's voice.
+
+"He was not talking aloud. It was a hurried sort of whisper. It seemed as
+if the voice, when at its natural pitch, would have been high or thin,
+more of a tenor than anything else. It gave me the impression of
+terrific anger, anger and threat combined. The only thing I heard from
+my sister was a stifled sound, as if she had tried to cry out and been
+prevented by--by choking."
+
+She looked out the window, her breast rising and falling while she
+compelled herself to calmness.
+
+Bristow was looking at her with hawk-like keenness.
+
+"And what did you do?" he asked, his voice low and cool.
+
+"I pulled the dining room door open. From where I stood, looking across
+the dining room into the living room, I could see the edge of my sister's
+skirt and--and a man's leg, the right leg.
+
+"That is, I didn't see much of his leg. What I did see was his foot, the
+sole of his shoe, a large shoe. He was in such a position that the foot
+was resting on its toes, perpendicular to the floor, so that I saw the
+whole sole of the rubber shoe."
+
+She put both hands to her face and closed her eyes, holding the attitude
+for several minutes. When she looked at him again, there were no tears
+in her eyes, but the traces of fear.
+
+"It seemed to me that he was leaning far forward, putting most of his
+weight on his left foot and balancing himself with the right thrust out
+behind him. There was something in the position of that leg which
+suggested great strength.
+
+"All that came to me in a minute, in a second. When I realized what I
+saw, the danger to Enid, I fainted, just crumpled up and slid to the
+floor, and everything went black before me. I don't think I had made a
+sound since leaving the sleeping porch."
+
+Bristow spoke quickly.
+
+"Miss Fulton, who was the man?"
+
+She overcame a momentary reluctance.
+
+"I'm not sure," she said slowly. "I am not sure. I thought it was either
+Henry Morley or George Withers."
+
+She turned away. A tremor shook her from head to foot.
+
+"Why?" he asked.
+
+"First, the voice," she replied, her face still averted. "It could so
+easily have been Mr. Morley's high voice lowered to a whisper; or it
+might have been George Withers'. When he's angry, his deep voice
+undergoes a curious change; it's horrid."
+
+"And the second reason?"
+
+"The man wore rubbers." She turned her face toward him. "I had seen Mr.
+Morley put his on two hours before that."
+
+"How about your brother-in-law?"
+
+"He's a crank on the subject--never goes out in the rain unless he has
+them on."
+
+"Think a moment, Miss Fulton. Couldn't that man have been a negro--the
+negro who is now held for the crime? He wore rubber-soled shoes. Could
+you swear that what you saw was not a rubber sole attached to a leather
+or canvass shoe?"
+
+"No; I couldn't."
+
+"And the voice? Did you hear any of the man's words? Could you swear that
+it wasn't the illiterate talk of an uneducated negro?"
+
+"No; I couldn't."
+
+"What made you think of Morley and Withers?"
+
+"Mr. Morley was in a raging temper with my sister when he left me--in
+connection with money matters. You know about that part of the affair?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And George's voice is always like the one I heard. It's like that when
+he gets--used to get--into a temper with Enid."
+
+Bristow felt immensely relieved. He was so sure of his case against Perry
+Carpenter that he refused to consider anything tending to obscure his own
+theory.
+
+"Are you still sure it was Mr. Morley or Mr. Withers?"
+
+"I think now," she answered, her voice hardly above a whisper, "it was
+George Withers."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Let me explain again. I lay there, where I had fainted, for hours, until
+just a few minutes before you answered my call for help. I must have had
+a terrific shock. When I recovered consciousness, I stumbled into the
+living room and saw--saw Enid. Her--oh, Mr. Bristow!--the sight of her
+face, of her mouth, paralyzed my voice.
+
+"I stood on the porch and tried to scream, but at first I couldn't. I
+only gasped and choked. I started down the steps, reached the bottom, and
+then found I could make myself heard. I ran back up the steps and stood
+there shrieking until I saw you coming. I suppose nobody had seen me go
+down the steps."
+
+"But that hasn't anything to do with Mr. Withers?"
+
+"Yes--yes, it has. When I went down the porch steps, I saw something
+lying in the grass, on the upper side of the steps, the side toward your
+house."
+
+She slipped her hand under one of the pillows.
+
+"It was this."
+
+She handed to Bristow an open-faced gold watch. He read on the back of it
+the initials, "G. S. W."
+
+"It's George Withers' watch," she said, "and, when I found it, he had not
+been on this side of Manniston Road, according to the story he told you
+and the chief of police."
+
+Bristow was thinking intently, a frown creasing his forehead. He was
+wishing that she had not found the watch. He reminded himself of the
+hysterical condition she had been in the day before. Perhaps, after all,
+this story was nothing but an unconscious invention--a fantasy which she
+thought to be the truth.
+
+"Why did you refuse yesterday to tell me this; and why do you volunteer
+it now?" he inquired, holding her glance with a cold, level look.
+
+"I'm afraid you won't understand," she answered, a little smile lifting
+the corners of her mouth, a smile which, somehow, still had in it a great
+deal of sorrow. "Yesterday I was still under the influence of the way I
+had lived all my life, subjugated, as it were, by the fact that my older
+sister was my father's favourite and by the further fact that my sister's
+personality was stronger than mine--at least, I had been taught to think
+so.
+
+"I don't want you to think I didn't love my sister. I did; but it made a
+cry-baby out of me. I always relied on others--do you see? But now, that
+influence is gone. I'm my own mistress; and I know it. I can and must do
+what strikes me as right."
+
+Bristow, close student of human nature that he was, did understand. There
+flashed across his mind a passage he had read in something by George
+Bernard Shaw: that nobody ever loses a friend or relative by death
+without experiencing some measure of relief.
+
+"Yes; I see what you mean," he assented; "its an instance of submerged
+personality--something of that sort."
+
+"Mr. Braceway is working with you, isn't he?" she asked suddenly.
+
+"Why, yes," he replied, surprised.
+
+"I thought," she continued, "that what I had seen would be of service
+to you and him. And I can't understand why father and George want
+all this secrecy. One would think they were afraid of finding out
+something--something to make them ashamed! What I want is to see the
+guilty man punished--that's all."
+
+He recalled Braceway's statement that he had been engaged to marry Maria
+Fulton. Could it be that she still loved him, and that the engagement to
+Morley, her helping him financially, had been all a pretense, the pitiful
+product of pique toward Braceway to show him she cared nothing for him?
+And now she wanted to help Braceway, not Bristow?
+
+He decided to ignore that part of the situation. The obvious
+incrimination of Withers gave him enough to think about. He was sorry it
+had happened. He did not believe there was the shadow of a case against
+him.
+
+He rose and handed the watch to Miss Fulton.
+
+"No," she objected; "I don't want it. You and Mr. Braceway, perhaps, will
+make use of it."
+
+He hesitated before putting it into his pocket.
+
+"Why did you send for me, Miss Fulton?" he asked, after thanking her for
+doing so. "Why me instead of your lawyer, Judge Rogers?"
+
+"He would have forbidden me to talk," she answered simply; "and I wanted
+to talk. I refuse ever again to carry around with me other people's
+secrets. It's too oppressive."
+
+"Have you told this to anybody else?--or do you intend to?"
+
+"No; nobody; and I won't."
+
+"Now, one thing about Mr. Morley: do you think he has stolen money--from
+his bank, for instance?"
+
+"Why, no! He was speculating--and losing. I'm glad you asked about him.
+I shall never see him again--never!"
+
+Bristow left her with the assurance that he and Braceway would make the
+best possible use of her theory and the facts she had adduced. He walked
+slowly back to his bungalow, his limp more pronounced than usual. He felt
+physically very tired.
+
+But of one thing he was still certain: the strength of his case
+against Perry Carpenter. He chose to stick to that, much more stubbornly
+than Braceway had refused to consider minutely the exact situation of
+Withers in regard to the crime. If Withers had murdered his wife,
+circumstances were now ideally in his favour. The two men, unusually
+brainy, quick thinkers, who were recognized by the police and the public
+as able to bring punishment on the guilty man, had other and opposing
+theories--theories which they were resolved to "put over," to
+substantiate. As matters stood now, the story Bristow had just heard was
+hardly a factor. The detectives were busy with ideas of their own.
+
+Maria Fulton, after the lame man had left her, lay back against her
+pillows and looked out the window with misty eyes. Counteracting the
+sorrow that had weighed upon her for two days, was her speculation as to
+how Braceway would receive the facts she had revealed.
+
+Would he see that her course was one which she intended to be of help to
+him?--that, not knowing how he would treat a direct message from her, she
+had sent it to him through another?--that she desired, above all things,
+his success in the investigation?
+
+"When I spoke to this man of Sam Braceway, my whole manner was a
+revelation of how I felt--a frank declaration! And, of course, he will
+tell him. If he doesn't----"
+
+She called Miss Kelly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+WHAT'S BRACEWAY'S GAME?
+
+
+Braceway, keeping his promise to have another conference with Bristow,
+sat on the porch of No. 9 and watched the last golden streamers the
+setting sun had flung above the blue edges of the mountains.
+
+He still carried his cane.
+
+"What's your plan now, Mr. Braceway?" Bristow inquired. "You think you'll
+follow Morley to Washington?"
+
+"Not follow him," the detective answered smilingly. "I'm going with him.
+That is, I'll take the same train he does."
+
+"Greenleaf told you, I suppose, that he'd given Morley permission to
+leave tonight?"
+
+"Yes--said you suggested it. And I think you're right. There's no use in
+losing time unnecessarily. Are you going, too?"
+
+"Oh, by all means," Bristow said quickly, "and against my doctor's
+orders. That is, if you don't object--if you don't think I'd be in the
+way."
+
+Braceway was clearly aware of the lame man's desire to accompany him so
+as to be associated with every phase of the work on the case, and to make
+it stand out emphatically in the long run that he, Bristow, pitting his
+ingenuity against Braceway, had gathered the evidence establishing the
+negro's guilt beyond question. The idea amused him, he was so sure of the
+accuracy of his own theory.
+
+"Not at all," he said heartily. "I want you to come."
+
+"How about avoiding him on the train? We don't want him to know we're his
+fellow-travellers."
+
+"Oh, no. He'll get aboard at the station here. I have a machine to take
+me--and you, of course--to Larrimore, the station seven miles out.
+They'll flag the train. We'll get into a stateroom and stay there; have
+our meals served right there. You see, we don't get into Washington until
+dark tomorrow night."
+
+"Yes; I see. The scheme's all right."
+
+They were silent for several minutes.
+
+"I've been thinking," said Bristow, "about Mrs. Withers having kept all
+her jewelry in the bungalow--unprotected, you know--nobody but her
+sister and herself there. It was risky."
+
+"Yes," agreed Braceway. "What do you get from that?"
+
+"Perhaps she was waiting--knew demands for money might come at any
+time--and was afraid to be caught without them."
+
+"Exactly. That's the way I figured it."
+
+They were silent again.
+
+Braceway was the first to speak. He narrated all the facts he had learned
+from Abrahamson and Roddy, and concluded with the story Withers had told
+him on the station platform. He held back none of the details. Evidently,
+his irritation toward Withers had subsided. When Bristow handed him the
+watch Maria Fulton had found, he said laughingly:
+
+"It's a good thing George told me about it, isn't it? Otherwise, we might
+have had to devote a lot of time to showing that he had nothing to do
+with the crime itself."
+
+"And yet," qualified Bristow, "he said nothing to explain why the watch
+should have been so far back in the grass and to the side of the steps in
+this direction. According to his story, he must have dropped it on the
+other side, the down side."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I don't see how it could have fallen where Miss Fulton found it unless
+somebody had actually picked it up and thrown it there. He told you he
+was all the time down on the sidewalk, and, when the other man flung him
+off, he reeled down-hill, not up."
+
+"That's hair-splitting," Braceway objected good-humouredly. "Nothing
+could make me think George responsible for the murder."
+
+Bristow repeated then everything Maria Fulton had said that afternoon,
+and gave a fair, clear idea of her strong suspicion that the murder had
+actually been done by either Withers or Morley. It had no effect on
+Braceway.
+
+"Miss Fulton," he said, "told you, of course, what she had seen and heard
+and, in addition, what she had guessed. But I don't see that it changes
+anything. I can't let it make me suspect Withers any more than I can
+accept as valuable Abrahamson's quite positive opinion that the man
+wearing the disguise was Withers. Things don't fit in. That's all. They
+don't fit into such a theory."
+
+"Have you ever thought," persisted Bristow, "why Withers told Greenleaf
+and me yesterday morning that he was in the pawnshop when the man with
+the gold tooth was in there? Why should he say that when Abrahamson
+contradicts it at once by telling you they were at no time in the shop
+simultaneously?"
+
+"Did Withers say to you outright, flat and unmistakably, that he saw the
+fellow inside the shop?" Braceway's voice had in it the ring of
+combativeness.
+
+Bristow tried to remember the exact words Withers had used. Also, his
+harping on Withers' possible guilt struck him as absurd when he
+considered the strength of the case against Perry.
+
+"I can't swear he did," he admitted at last; "but there's no doubt about
+the impression he gave us. Why, Abrahamson himself told you Greenleaf was
+positive Withers and the other man were there at the same time."
+
+"Oh," Braceway said, obviously a little bored, "That's one of the things
+we have to watch for in these cases--wild impressions, the construing of
+words in a different way by everybody who heard them. It's a minor detail
+anyway."
+
+"I don't get you at all," Bristow said, eyeing him intently.
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Your conviction that Morley's the guilty man, your refusal to accept the
+case against Perry Carpenter, and your impatience in discussing Withers."
+
+"Think over Miss Fulton's story," Braceway retorted. "If it does anything
+at all, it strengthens the suspicion that Morley's the man we want. And
+Roddy's story--on its face, it damns Morley! Withers had no motive
+except, a remote possibility, that of jealousy. Morley's motive was as
+old as time; the desperate need of money."
+
+"Well, let's grant that, for the moment. What do you do with the evidence
+against the negro? He was after money."
+
+Braceway laughed.
+
+"To tell the truth," he admitted, "I don't do anything with it. I'll go
+further: it seems flawless, and yet----"
+
+His face settled into serious lines.
+
+"The report from the laboratory is unanswerable," Bristow went on. "It's
+as good as a statement from an eyewitness."
+
+"Yes; it is. Still, in some way, I don't feel sure--But I'll say this: if
+my trip to Washington, our trip, isn't successful, I'll quit guessing and
+theorizing. I'll agree, without reservation, that Perry's the man."
+
+Bristow hesitated before making his next remark:
+
+"Of course, I'm not employed by Withers. My only connection with the case
+is a volunteer one. Yours is entirely different--and I realize that there
+may be--well--things you know and don't want me to know. But I can't help
+wondering whether Morley is the only consideration that takes you to
+Washington, whether there mightn't be something else relating, in a way,
+to the case--relating to it and yet not necessarily tied to it directly."
+
+"What kind of something?" Braceway retorted.
+
+"Say, for instance, something ugly, something painful to Fulton and
+Withers--terrific scandal, perhaps."
+
+Braceway thought a moment.
+
+"You've a keen mind, Mr. Bristow," he said finally. "I can't discuss that
+phase of it now, but you're partially right; although I'll say frankly,
+if Morley wasn't going to Washington, I wouldn't go either."
+
+"Thanks; I appreciate your telling me that much. Now, let me ask one more
+question: why, exactly are you following Morley?"
+
+"I'll tell you," Braceway replied with spirit. "It's a fair question, and
+I'll answer it. I'm going there on a hunch. I can't persuade myself that
+Perry's guilty, and I've a hunch that I'm now on the trail of the right
+man. And, as long as I'm in the business as a professional detective, I
+don't propose to disregard one scintilla of evidence, one smallest clue.
+I'll run down every tip and any hunch before I'll quit a case, saying
+virtually: 'Well, that man, or this man, _seems_ guilty; go ahead and
+string him up.'
+
+"No innocent man's going to his death as long as I feel there's a chance
+of the guilty fellow being around and laughing up his sleeve. That's the
+whole thing in a nutshell. That's why I'm after Morley! That's why I'm
+going to Washington."
+
+Bristow, responding warmly to the other's voice and mood, leaned forward
+and grasped his hand.
+
+"Good!" he said. "That's fine--and I'm with you."
+
+"It's the only way to look at this work. Without the proper ideals, it's
+a rotten business. But, with the right viewpoint, it's great, at times
+far more valuable than the work of lawyers and judges."
+
+"I'm glad you said that," Bristow declared; "very glad, because I'm
+thinking of going into it myself."
+
+"You are?" Braceway appeared surprised; or his emotion might have been
+sympathy for a man driven to the choice of a new profession in life.
+
+"Yes. I was talking about it to Greenleaf this afternoon. I realize--I'd
+be foolish if I didn't--that this case has given me a lot of publicity.
+It has put me where I can say I know something about crime and criminals,
+although, up until this murder, the knowledge has been mostly on paper."
+
+"Yes; I know."
+
+"But now, since I'm stuck down here for this long convalescence, it's the
+best thing I can do; in fact, it's the only thing. I've drifted through
+life fooling with real estate and writing now and then a little, a very
+little, poor fiction. Neither occupation would support me in Furmville;
+and I think I could make good as a sort of consulting detective and
+criminologist. There's money in it, isn't there?"
+
+"Yes; good money," Braceway replied without much enthusiasm. "But there
+are times when it's heart-breaking work, this thing of running down the
+guilty, the scum of the earth, the failures, the rotters, and the rats.
+It isn't all a Fourth of July celebration with the bands playing and your
+name in the papers."
+
+"Oh, I understand that. Any profession has its drawbacks."
+
+"But you have the analytical mind. And, as I just said, there's money in
+it."
+
+The glow had faded from the sky, and, with the darkness, there had come a
+noticeable chill in the air. Braceway yawned and stretched his arms. In
+addition to his talks with Abrahamson, Roddy, and Withers, he had also
+interviewed Perry and Lucy Thomas.
+
+"By George!" he said explosively. "I'm tired. I don't know when I've been
+this tired. This has been a real day, something popping every minute
+since I got here this morning."
+
+Bristow did not answer that. He was thinking of the impression he had
+received from Maria Fulton that she was still in love with Braceway. He
+had had that idea quite vividly while talking to her. He wondered now
+whether he had better mention it to Braceway. No, he decided; the time
+for that would come after the grinding work in Washington. Bristow
+himself was far from being a sentimental man. If he had been in
+Braceway's place, he would have preferred to hear nothing about the girl
+and her emotions until after the completion of the work.
+
+"Are you packed up?" Braceway asked. "Ready to go?"
+
+"Almost."
+
+"Well, suppose we drift on down to the Brevord. No; I forgot. You'd
+rather drive down, wouldn't you? Walking would bother that leg. I'll send
+the machine up for you."
+
+"Thanks," Bristow accepted appreciatively. "That will be best."
+
+"All right. I'll have it up here in an hour or so. You can pick me up,
+and we'll run out to Larrimore."
+
+He went down Manniston Road, his heels striking hard against the
+concrete. Under the light at the far corner he flashed into Bristow's
+vision, twirling his cane on his thumb; his erect, alert figure giving
+little evidence of the weariness he had felt a few minutes before.
+
+The lame man lingered on the porch, considering Braceway's confident
+assertion that he did not "propose to disregard one scintilla of
+evidence, one smallest clue." But, he reflected, that was exactly what
+Braceway was doing: not only disregarding one scintilla, but keeping
+himself blind to a great many clues, the evidence against George Withers
+and that against the negro.
+
+"I can't make out his game," he concluded. "What's his idea about
+scandal, I wonder? The only possible scandal lies in the fact that Mrs.
+Withers paid blackmail for years. And the only way to make the fact
+public is to keep on denying that Perry's guilty. He seems to be trying
+to dig up scandal instead of hiding it."
+
+Suddenly, with his characteristic quickness of thought, he realized that
+he disliked Braceway, definitely felt an aversion for him. When he was
+in Braceway's presence, influenced by his vitality and magnetism and
+listening to his conversation, he lost sight of his real feeling; but,
+left to himself, it came to the surface strongly. He wished he had never
+met the man. He knew he would never get close to him. And yet, he
+thought, why dislike him?
+
+"Oh, he isn't my kind. _I_ don't know. Yes, I know. He's just an edition
+de luxe of the ordinary four-flusher, a lot of biff-bang talk and bluff."
+He laughed, perhaps ridiculing himself. "Why waste mental energy on him?
+I've worked this case out. He hasn't."
+
+And public opinion was with him. It conceded that he had the right answer
+to the puzzle. At that very moment the "star" reporter of _The Sentinel_
+was hammering out on his typewriter the following paragraph for
+publication in the morning:
+
+"While it is generally recognized that Chief Greenleaf deserves great
+praise for the promptness with which the guilty man was discovered, the
+chief himself called attention this evening to the invaluable assistance
+he had received from Mr. Lawrence Bristow, already a well-known authority
+on crime. It was Bristow who, in addition to other brilliant work, forged
+the last and most impressive link in the chain of evidence against
+Carpenter. He did this by suggesting that the tests be made to determine
+whether or not the negro's finger nails showed traces of a white person's
+skin."
+
+Later on in his story, the reporter wrote:
+
+"Not a clue has yet been uncovered leading to the location of the stolen
+jewelry."
+
+If Braceway could have read that, he would have said: "Wait until we get
+to Washington. That's where we'll come across the jewels. Give us time."
+
+Bristow, having a different opinion, would have refused to divulge it.
+The last thing he expected, was any such result in Washington.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+AT THE ANDERSON NATIONAL BANK
+
+
+When the train pulled into Washington at eleven o'clock, Henry Morley,
+the first passenger to alight, shook off the red-cap porters who grabbed
+at his grips, and hurried toward the gates. Braceway, well hidden by
+shadows just inside the big side-door of one of the baggage coaches,
+observed how pale and haggard he looked under the strong glare of the
+arc-lights.
+
+"Hardly more than a kid!" thought the detective, with involuntary
+sympathy. "Why is it that most of the criminals are merely children? If
+they were all hardened and abandoned old thugs this work would be
+easier."
+
+Nevertheless, he kept his eyes on Morley and, a moment later, moved a
+step forward. This made him visible to a well-dressed, sleek-looking man
+who up to that time had been standing on the dark side of the great steel
+pillar directly across the platform from the baggage car. Braceway, with
+a quick gesture, indicated the identity of Morley, and the sleek-looking
+man, suddenly coming to life, fell into the stream of street-bound
+passengers.
+
+Braceway went back to the Pullman and rejoined Bristow, who was waiting
+for him in the stateroom.
+
+In the taxicab on their way to the Willard Hotel, the lame man lay back
+against the cushion, apparently tired out and making no pretense of
+interest in anything. Braceway muttered something inaudible.
+
+"What's that?" Bristow asked, opening his eyes.
+
+"I'd been thinking what a pity it is that most criminals are youngsters.
+When you nab them, you feel as if they hadn't a fair show; it hardly
+seems a sporting proposition. After that, I soothed myself by considering
+the satisfaction one feels in landing the old birds, the ones who know
+better."
+
+"I can appreciate that," the other agreed. "That may be one reason why
+I'm glad I've fastened the thing on an ignorant negro rather than on a
+fellow like Morley."
+
+"You've too much confidence in circumstantial evidence, Bristow. I
+remember what an old lawyer once told me: 'Circumstantial evidence is
+like a woman, too tricky--and tells a different story every day.'"
+
+At the Willard, finding that adjoining rooms were not to be had, they
+were put on different floors. Going toward the elevators, Braceway said:
+
+"Unless something unexpected turns up, let's have breakfast at eight."
+
+"And then, what?"
+
+"Go to the Anderson National Bank. A man named Beale, Joseph Beale, is
+its president. We'll have to persuade him to have the records examined,
+to see how Morley stands. If he's wrong, short, the rest will be easy."
+
+"Very good. Did your man pick him up at the train?"
+
+"Oh, yes. Platt's always on the job. He and his partner, Delaney,
+generally deliver."
+
+"Who are they?" Bristow asked, interested. "How do they happen to be
+working for you?"
+
+"They belong to a private bureau here, Golson's. Golson and I have worked
+together before."
+
+In the elevator Bristow was thinking that the matter of becoming a
+professional detective was not as simple as it had appeared to him. The
+work required colleagues, assistants, "shadowers," and reciprocal
+arrangements with bureaus in other cities. It was like any other
+profitable business, complicated, demanding constant attention.
+
+When they met at breakfast, Braceway had already received Platt's report.
+
+"Nothing developed last night," he told Bristow. "Platt followed Morley,
+who went straight to his home. He and his mother live in a little house
+far out on R Street northwest. Morley took the street car and was home by
+a little after half-past eleven. The lights were all out by a quarter
+past twelve. This morning at six-thirty, when Delaney relieved Platt, our
+man hadn't left the house."
+
+"What's your guess about today?"
+
+"Either he'll go to the bank on time this morning, to throw off
+suspicion," said Braceway, "or, if he mailed the jewelry to himself here
+the night of the murder, he'll try to pawn them in Baltimore or at a
+pawnshop in Virginia, just across the river. There are no pawnshops in
+Washington. There's a law that interferes."
+
+"Delaney won't lose him?"
+
+"Not a chance."
+
+During the meal he saw that Bristow was completely worn out. As a matter
+of fact, he looked actually sick.
+
+"See here," Braceway said as they were ready to leave the table; "you
+look all in, done out."
+
+Bristow did not deny it.
+
+"I didn't sleep very well last night. It was close in my room, and this
+morning the humidity's oppressive. You know what that does to us of the
+T. B. tribe."
+
+"Suppose you get some more rest. It's going to be a sweltering day."
+
+"Oh, I can stand it. I want to go with you. I'm not going to feel any
+worse than I do now."
+
+But the other was insistent. Bristow at last gave in. He would take the
+rest if Braceway would report progress to him at noon.
+
+Returning to his room, the sick man swore savagely.
+
+"Friday!" he said aloud. "Damn it all anyway!"
+
+Braceway lingered several minutes on the steps outside the Anderson
+National Bank. He felt reluctant to go inside and start the machinery
+that would ruin Morley. It wasn't absolutely necessary, he argued, with
+something like weakness; he could, perhaps, find out all he wanted to
+know without----
+
+He thought suddenly of the bizarre performances of the thing men call
+Fate. Because a woman is murdered under mysterious circumstances in a
+little southern city, evidence is uncovered showing that a panic-stricken
+boy has been stealing money from a bank hundreds of miles away; a
+detective is employed by the dead woman's husband; the detective is
+thrown again into contact with the victim's sister and realizes more
+clearly than ever that he loves her.
+
+What would be the result of it all--the result for him? He remembered the
+gown she had worn to a ball, something of the palest yellow--how the blue
+of her eyes and the gleam of her hair had been emphasized by the simple
+perfection of the gown. What would she say if he went back to----
+
+He forced himself down to reality.
+
+He entered the bank and discovered that Morley had not reported for work.
+Having presented his card to a chilly, monosyllabic little man, he was
+shown, after a short wait, into a private office where, surrounded by
+several tons of mahogany, Mr. Joseph Beale reigned supreme.
+
+Mr. Beale struck him as a fattened duplicate of Mr. Illington, thin of
+lip, hard of eye, slow and precise in enunciation. In spite of his
+stoutness, he had the same long, slender fingers, easy to grasp with, and
+the same mechanical Punch-and-Judy smile. When he greeted the detective,
+his voice was like a slow, thin stream that had run over ice.
+
+"I'm not on a pleasant mission, Mr. Beale," Braceway began. "It's
+something in the line of duty."
+
+The bank president looked at the card which had been handed to him.
+
+"Ahem!" he said, with a lip smile. "You're a detective?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, Mr. Braceway, what is it? Let's see whether I can do anything for
+you. At least, I assume you want----"
+
+This ruffled Braceway.
+
+"I want nothing," he said crisply; "and I'm afraid I'm going to do
+something for you."
+
+The banker stiffened.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It's one of your employés; in fact, it's your receiving teller."
+
+"What! Henry Morley! Impossible, sir! Outrageous! Preposterous!"
+
+"Just a moment, if you please," put in Braceway. "I was going to say that
+I was positive about nothing. I've been compelled to suspect, however,
+that Mr. Morley might be short in his accounts. There are unexplained
+circumstances which seem to connect Mr. Morley with the murder of a
+woman. Therefore----"
+
+"One of the--one of my employés a thief and a murderer!" Mr. Beale pushed
+back his chair and fell to patting his knees with his fists. "Great God,
+Mr.----" He looked at the card again. "Why, Mr. Braceway, I can't believe
+it. It would be treason to this bank, treason to all its traditions!" He
+had not suffered such an attack of garrulity for the past twenty years.
+"And Morley, his family, his birth! By George, sir, his blood! Are we to
+lose all faith in blood?"
+
+"As I wanted to say," Braceway managed to break in, "the murder of Mrs.
+George S. Withers in Furmville, North Carolina, led----"
+
+This was the crowning blow. Mr. Beale gasped several times in rapid
+succession, not entirely hiding his slight, cold resemblance to a fish.
+
+"Mrs. Withers!" he got out at last. "The daughter of my old friend, Will
+Fulton! Fulton, one of our depositors!"
+
+He was reduced to silent horror.
+
+Braceway took advantage of his condition and outlined the circumstances
+in considerable detail.
+
+"If he's short in his accounts," he concluded, "the motive for the murder
+is established. And, if he's been stealing from the bank, you want to
+know it."
+
+Mr. Beale pushed a bell-button.
+
+"Charles," he said to the chilly little man, "tell Mr. Jones I want to
+speak to him. Our first vice-president," he explained to Braceway.
+
+Mr. Jones, evidently dressed and ready for the part of president of the
+bank whenever Mr. Beale should see fit to die, came in and, with frowns,
+"dear-dears" and tongue-clucking, heard from the president the story of
+what had befallen the Anderson National.
+
+"How soon," inquired Beale, "can we give this--er--gentleman an answer,
+a definite answer, as to whether Morley, the unspeakable scoundrel, is a
+thief?"
+
+Mr. Jones considered sadly.
+
+"Perhaps, very soon; two o'clock or something like that--and again it may
+take time to find anything. Suppose we say five or half-past five this
+afternoon; to be safe, you understand. Half-past five?"
+
+"Very well," agreed Beale, and turned to Braceway: "Will that be
+satisfactory?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+Braceway left them, their mask-like faces plainly damaged by anxiety;
+their cool, slow utterance slightly humanized by the realization that
+they must act at once. In fact, as the detective closed the door of the
+private office, Mr. Jones was reaching with long, slender fingers for the
+telephone. They would need the best accountant they could find for the
+quick work they had promised Braceway.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+THE DISCOVERY OF THE JEWELS
+
+
+Braceway returned to the lobby of his hotel, and, having bought half
+a dozen New York newspapers, settled down to wait for a report from
+Golson's bureau concerning Morley's movements. A little after eleven he
+was called to the telephone.
+
+"Your man caught the eight o'clock train for Baltimore." Golson himself
+gave the information. "Delaney also caught it. They got to Baltimore
+at nine. Your man took a taxi straight to the shop of an old fellow named
+Eidstein, reaching there at twenty minutes past nine. He and Eidstein
+went into Eidstein's private office back of the shop and stayed there for
+over an hour, in fact until about half-past ten. Your man came out and
+went to a down-town hotel. He was there when Delaney, still sticking to
+him, managed to get a wire to me telling me what I've just told you."
+
+"Fine!" said Braceway. "What was he doing in the hotel? Did he meet
+anybody, or write anything?"
+
+"Delaney didn't say."
+
+"Who's this Eidstein, a pawn broker?"
+
+"No; he's a dealer in antiques: furniture, old gold, old jewels, anything
+old. He stands well over there. He's all right. I know all about him."
+
+"That's funny, isn't it?"
+
+"What's funny?"
+
+"That he didn't go to a pawnshop."
+
+"Keep your shirt on," laughed Golson. "The day's not over yet."
+
+"No doubt about that. What about Corning, the loan-shark in Virginia?"
+
+"I've got a man over there, just as you asked. Shall I keep him on?"
+
+"Sure!" snapped Braceway. "Suppose Morley gives Delaney the slip in
+Baltimore and doubles back to Corning's! Keep him there all day."
+
+He left the telephone and went up to Bristow's room, No. 717. When he
+knocked, the door was opened by a young woman in the uniform and cap
+of a trained nurse.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he began, "I got the wrong room, I'm afraid. I----"
+
+"This is Mr. Bristow's room," she said in a low tone. "Are you Mr.
+Braceway?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Come in, then, please." She stepped back and held open the door. "Mr.
+Bristow's still very weak, but he told me to let you in. He said he must
+see you as soon as you arrived."
+
+Braceway saw that there was no bed in the room, and asked where the sick
+man was. The nurse pointed to a closed door leading into the adjoining
+room.
+
+"What's the matter with him?" he asked. "By George! He hasn't had a
+hemorrhage, has he?"
+
+"Yes, sir. That's exactly what he has had. The doctor says all he needs
+now is rest. He doesn't think there's any real danger. Will you go in to
+see him?"
+
+She quietly opened the door to the sickroom. Braceway went in on tiptoes,
+but Bristow stirred and turned toward him when the nurse put up the
+window shade.
+
+"You'll have to lie still, Mr. Bristow," she cautioned on her way out.
+"It's so important to keep these ice-packs in place."
+
+"Thanks, Miss Martin; I shall get on," he answered in a voice so weak
+that it startled Braceway.
+
+"I don't think you'd better talk," said his visitor. "Really, I
+wouldn't."
+
+Bristow gave him a wry smile.
+
+"It's nothing serious; just a--pretty bad hemorrhage," he said, finding
+it necessary to pause between words. "The boneheaded Mowbray--my
+physician in Furmville, you know--was right for once. He said--this might
+happen."
+
+"I'm going out and let you sleep," Braceway insisted, displaying the
+average man's feeling of absolute helplessness in a sickroom.
+
+"No, not yet. The fellow I had in--knows his business--put ice on the
+lung and on my heart--gave me something to lessen the heart action."
+
+"And you're not in pain?"
+
+"No. I'll be all right in--in a little--One thing I wanted to--tell you.
+Quite important--really."
+
+He mopped his forehead with tremulous, futile little dabs which
+accentuated his weakness. Braceway instinctively drew his chair closer
+to the bed so as to catch all of the scarcely audible words.
+
+"Just occurred to me," the sick man struggled on, "just--before I had
+this hemor--Ought to have somebody, extra man, working with Platt and
+Delaney. Tell you why: if Morley mailed the jewelry that--night of
+the murder, he wasn't fool--enough to mail it to himself or to his
+own--house. If he visits anybody today--we ought to have an extra man
+with Delaney. Delaney can keep on Morley's trail--extra man can watch
+and--if necessary, question anybody Morley visits or consults with.
+Then----"
+
+"Correct!" exclaimed Braceway. "Right you are! Who says you're sick? Why,
+your bean's working fine. Don't try to talk any more. I'm going out to
+get busy on that very suggestion."
+
+"Another thing," Bristow said, lifting a feeble hand to detain his
+visitor. "Come up here at six--this evening, will you? I'll have my
+strength back by that time. Don't laugh. I will. I know I will. I've had
+hemorrhages before this."
+
+"What do you want to do at six?"
+
+"Help you--be with you when you question Morley. Promise me. I'll be in
+shape by that time."
+
+Braceway promised, and went into the outer room.
+
+"Do you think," he asked Miss Martin, "there's the slightest chance of
+his getting up this evening, or tonight?"
+
+"I really don't know," she smiled. "There may be. It all depends on his
+courage, his nerve. Anyway, he won't be able to do much, to exert
+himself."
+
+"He's got the nerve," Braceway said admiringly; "got plenty of it. By the
+way, how did it happen? How do you happen to be here?"
+
+"It seems that at about a quarter to ten Mr. Bristow called the
+downstairs operator and asked her to send a bellboy to his room,
+number seven-seventeen. When the boy came in here, Mr. Bristow was
+lying across the foot of his bed, pressing to his mouth a towel that
+was half-saturated with blood.
+
+"He had dropped his saturated handkerchief on the bathroom floor. And he
+evidently had been bleeding when he was at the telephone. He was awfully
+weak, so weak that the boy thought he was dying. He couldn't speak. The
+boy remembered having seen the house physician, Dr. Carey, at a late
+breakfast in the café, and got him up here at once. Dr. Carey called me
+to take the case as soon as he had seen Mr. Bristow.
+
+"I think that's all. Of course, the bed that was in here and all the
+other soiled things had been removed by the time I came in; and the
+management insisted on his taking the extra room."
+
+"Thank you," said Braceway. "I'm glad to get the details. You'll see that
+he has everything he needs, won't you?"
+
+A few minutes later, when Miss Martin entered the bedroom to lower the
+window shade, Bristow told her:
+
+"I think I'll sleep now. Shut the door and, on no account, let--anybody,
+doctor or anybody else--wake me up. You call me at six, please. What
+time is it now? Twelve-fifteen? Remember, you'll let me sleep?"
+
+Braceway went to his own room to brush up for lunch. Although he had not
+taken the trouble to tell Bristow, he had already arranged with Golson to
+have the "extra man" on the job. He was taking no chances. He smiled when
+he thought of the sick man's eagerness to give him advice.
+
+It occurred to him that he should have communicated with George Withers.
+The funeral was over; had been set for yesterday. He would send him a
+wire as soon as he went downstairs.
+
+"By George!" Braceway communed with himself. "If I hadn't been his
+friend, I probably would have worried him. Even if Morley has embezzled
+from the bank, how closely have I coupled him with the crime? Not very
+closely unless he tries to pawn, or produces, some of the stolen
+stuff--not any more closely than George has coupled himself with it!
+George acted like such an ass!"
+
+He was about to leave the room when, for the first time, he looked the
+situation squarely in the face and made an important acknowledgment to
+himself. There had been in his mind, ever since that train had pulled out
+of Furmville with George's rattling whisper still sounding in his ear,
+the desire and the plan to safeguard George. He had felt, on this trip,
+that, if his theory about the case broke down, it might be advisable,
+even necessary, to produce all the evidence possible to shield his friend
+either from ugly gossip or from the down-right charge of murder. He did
+not believe for a moment that Withers was guilty.
+
+If things went wrong in the next eight or ten hours, if it was proved
+that Morley had nothing to do with the murder, the thing he wanted above
+all else was a story from Morley that he, Morley, had seen the struggle
+in front of No. 5 as Withers had described it. Somehow, that story about
+the struggle had struck him as the weakest link in George's whole story.
+
+He had resolutely refused to consider it up to now, but he no longer
+could dodge it. He had come to Washington to catch the criminal. But he
+also had come with the subconscious plan of getting at anything that
+would help Withers.
+
+He stood for an instant, jangling the room key in his hand. A frown drew
+his brows together. The frown deepened. He unlocked the door, went back
+into the room, and put down his cane, leaning it against the wall near
+the bureau.
+
+He reached the lobby in time to hear a callboy paging him. There was a
+telegram for him. It read:
+
+  "Mr. S. S. Braceway, Willard Hotel, Washington, D. C.
+
+  "Here.
+
+  (Signed) "Frank Abrahamson."
+
+"What the devil does he mean?" he asked himself several times. "What's
+this 'here' about?"
+
+He thought a long time before he remembered having asked the Furmville
+pawn broker to try to recall where he had seen the bearded man in
+another disguise, a disguise which, apparently, had consisted of nothing
+but a black moustache and bushy eyebrows. And Abrahamson had promised
+to wire him if he did remember. The "here" meant it was in Furmville that
+he had seen the moustached man.
+
+He went to the telegraph desk and wrote out a message:
+
+  "Mr. Frank Abrahamson, 329 College Street,
+   Furmville, N. C.
+
+  "Silence.
+
+  (Signed) "Braceway."
+
+"One-word telegrams!" he smiled grimly. "Thrifty fellows, these chosen
+people."
+
+He found the telephone booths and called up Golson.
+
+"Got anything from Baltimore?" he inquired.
+
+"Just been talking to Delaney on long-distance," Golson answered without
+enthusiasm.
+
+"Well! What is it?"
+
+"Your man gave him the slip a quarter of an hour ago, and he wants----"
+
+"Gave him the slip!" shouted Braceway. "What are you talking about?"
+
+"I don't like it any more than you do," snapped Golson. "But that's what
+happened: gave him the slip."
+
+"How?"
+
+"I didn't get that exactly. Delaney merely said he lost him in the hotel.
+Your man was evidently waiting there for a message or phone call. If he
+received it, Delaney was fooled. Anyway, he's gone now; and Delaney wants
+to know what he's to do. What'll I tell him?"
+
+"Tell him to go to hell!" Braceway said hotly. "No! Tell him to go back
+to Eidstein's and wait there until Morley shows up. That's his only
+chance to pick him up again."
+
+"O.K.," growled Golson.
+
+"Say! Put somebody on the job of watching for the incoming trains from
+Baltimore, will you? Right away?"
+
+"Platt's just come into the office. I'll send him to the station at
+once."
+
+"What time did Delaney lose sight of Morley?"
+
+"Twelve forty-five."
+
+Braceway hung up the receiver and looked at his watch. It was ten minutes
+past one. He had fifty minutes to kill before keeping an appointment he
+had made with Major Ross, chief of the Washington police.
+
+After a quick lunch, he strolled over to the news-stand and picked up the
+early edition of an afternoon paper.
+
+The first headlines he saw were:
+
+     STOLEN GEMS FOUND
+     IN SUSPECT'S YARD
+
+Under these lines was a dispatch from Furmville giving the information
+that plain-clothes men of the Furmville police force had discovered the
+emerald-and-diamond lavalliere worn by Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers the night
+she was murdered. The jewelry had been found in the yard of the house
+where Perry Carpenter had lived. The lavaliere was concealed in tall
+grass immediately beneath the window of Carpenter's room, and thus had at
+first escaped the eyes of the police. When found, it was intact except
+for the six links that had been broken from the chain and dropped the
+night of the murder.
+
+Braceway threw down the paper and went to the Pennsylvania Avenue door.
+
+"Damn!" he addressed mentally the top of the Washington monument. "More
+grist for Bristow's mill! I'm not crazy, am I? I'm not that crazy, that's
+sure!"
+
+He set out to keep his appointment with Major Ross. After all, he felt
+reasonably sure of himself, and he had made up his mind to carry things
+through as he originally had intended. His shoulders were well back, his
+step elastic and quick. He flung off discouragement as if it had been an
+over-coat too warm for that weather.
+
+He would not permit Delaney's fiasco to annoy him. The Baltimore police
+had been tipped to watch the pawnshops; Delaney probably would pick
+Morley up again; and there was the extra man yet to be heard from.
+Besides, Morley would break down and confess cleanly after his fright on
+being arrested. Things were not so bad after all.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+BRISTOW SOLVES A PROBLEM
+
+
+Mr. Beale and Mr. Jones were, so far as their exteriors showed, nearly
+back to the normal iciness of their every-day appearance when Braceway
+found them in the president's office a few minutes after half-past five.
+He did not have to ask what they had discovered; their faces were frank
+confessions. He dropped into a chair and smiled.
+
+"How much?"
+
+Mr. Beale cleared his throat and moved his lips deliberately one against
+the other.
+
+"Before I say anything else, Mr.--er--Braceway, I want to express to you
+not only my own gratitude but that of all the officers and directors of
+the Anderson National. You have, it seems, saved us from great trouble.
+As things are, they are bad enough. But you have enabled us to put our
+fingers on the--ah--situation almost in time."
+
+He glanced at Jones.
+
+"Briefly," the vice-president took up the statement, "it has been
+established, thus far, that Morley has stolen from the Anderson National
+the--"
+
+Mr. Beale's composure broke down at this. He interrupted the
+subordinate's calm explanation:
+
+"Stolen from the Anderson National! Think of that, sir! Of all the
+outrageous things, of all the unqualifiedly and absolutely incredible
+things! We have in our bank, on our payrolls, a thief, an unmitigated
+scoundrel!" He pushed back his chair and drummed on his knees. "We find
+that one of his thefts was seven hundred dollars, and another five
+hundred. We--I--trusted him, trusted him! And with what result?"
+
+He slid his chair forward and bruised his fist by striking the desk with
+all his strength.
+
+"And the crudity of his methods! Preposterous! The old trick of entries
+in pass-books and no entries in the records! He chose, for his own
+safety, depositors who carried large balances and were not apt to draw
+out anywhere near their total balance. It's the most abominable----"
+
+Between the outbursts of the president and the cold, lifeless words of
+the vice-president, Braceway managed to elicit these facts: they expected
+to uncover more than the $1,200 shortage already established; when they
+could examine all the pass-books now out of the bank, the total would
+undoubtedly be found much larger; they demanded Morley's arrest at once;
+in fact, if the law had allowed it, they would have sent him to the
+scaffold within the next hour.
+
+"Now," the detective reminded them, "he's also under suspicion of
+murder."
+
+"My God!" spluttered Beale. "What do we care about murder? Hasn't he
+tried to murder this bank? Hasn't he assassinated, so far as he could,
+its good name? Get him! Put him behind the bars!"
+
+At last they agreed to Braceway's plan: Morley was to be arrested by one
+of Major Ross' plain-clothes men when he stepped off the train from
+Baltimore. It was to be done quietly, so that the news of it would not
+be in the morning's papers.
+
+He was then to be taken to one of the outlying police stations for the
+sake of privacy, was to be told that he was charged with embezzlement;
+and then, having been frightened by the arrest, he would be compelled to
+undergo the cross-examination of Braceway and Bristow, who wanted to
+prove or disprove his connection with the murder in Furmville.
+
+Braceway returned to the hotel to await a report from either Major Ross
+or Delaney.
+
+Delaney came into the lobby and joined him. They went straight to
+Braceway's room.
+
+"We caught the five o'clock in Baltimore and got here a little before
+six," the big man started his story. "One of the men from headquarters
+stepped up to him and arrested him. I figured you had arranged for it, so
+I beat it up here."
+
+"What happened in Baltimore?" asked Braceway in a tone so friendly that
+it dissipated much of the other's embarrassment.
+
+"I declare, Mr. Braceway," he said humbly, "I don't know how it happened.
+I never had such a thing hit me before. But I lost him slick as a
+whistle. I was in the bar of the hotel, and he was sitting in the lobby.
+I had my eye right on him, and he had no idea I was following him. Then,
+all at once, after I'd turned to the barkeeper just long enough to order
+a soft drink, I looked around, and he was gone. I combed the house from
+top to bottom, but it was no use. He had ducked me clean."
+
+"What time was that?"
+
+"Twelve-forty-five."
+
+"And then what?"
+
+"The chief gave me your message, and I went back to keep a look on
+Eidstein's place. I didn't think he'd show there again, but he did--at
+four o'clock and stayed there almost half an hour. After that, he went to
+the station, me right after him. We both caught the five o'clock for
+Washington."
+
+"Did you talk with Eidstein?"
+
+"No, sir; had no orders. But he's no loan-shark, and no fence. Eidstein's
+on the level. We know all about him."
+
+"How did Morley look when he showed up there the second time?"
+
+"Done up, sir, fagged out. That's what makes me uneasy. He'd been up to
+something that shook him, something that rattled his teeth. He looked
+it."
+
+"Pawning something, perhaps?"
+
+"That's just it--just the way I figured it--something he knew was
+risky--something that made him sweat blood."
+
+"Well, it's all right," Braceway concluded. "There's nothing for you to
+worry about. It may be that losing him was the best thing you ever did.
+I'm not sure, but it may turn out so."
+
+Delaney, greatly relieved, thanked him and left.
+
+Braceway hurried to the sick man's room and, having been ushered in by
+Miss Martin, found him, fully dressed, sitting on the edge of the bed. He
+was still pale and looked tired, but his voice was strong. He was setting
+down a half-empty glass of water on a tray near the bed, and his hand,
+although it wavered a little, had lost the helpless tremulousness
+Braceway had noticed at noon.
+
+"Hello!" said the visitor. "You're a wonder! I expected to find you
+prostrated."
+
+"Oh, no," Bristow answered quietly. "I knew the rest and sleep would
+bring me around all right, and Miss Martin has given me a twentieth of a
+grain of strychnine. What's the news?"
+
+"I'll sketch it to you. But how about dinner?"
+
+"I've arranged for us to have it up here, if you don't mind?"
+
+Braceway agreed, and Miss Martin straightened up the other room, where
+the meal was served.
+
+Bristow, restricting himself to clam broth, crackers, and coffee, heard
+the story of the day's developments with profound interest. Except for
+the little tremor in his fingers, there was no sign that he had been ill
+a few hours earlier. Not a detail escaped him. The whole thing was
+photographed on his mind, even the hours and minutes of the time at which
+this or that had occurred.
+
+"So," concluded Braceway, "you can see why I feel pretty fine! Morley's
+a thief, as I'd believed all along. The motive for the murder is
+established, particularly when you remember that Miss Fulton, who had
+been advancing him money, was prevented by her sister from doing so any
+further."
+
+"No; I can't see that," objected Bristow. "A motive? Yes; but not a
+motive for murder. So far as I can size it up, he wanted to steal more
+money, and that's all. It's a far cry between theft and murder."
+
+"You stick to your old theory, the negro's guilt?"
+
+"Naturally. There you have the motive and the murder--the proof that he
+said he would rob, and the indisputable evidence that he did rob and
+kill. Why, he brought away with him particles of the victim's body! What
+more do you want?"
+
+For a long moment their glances interlocked and held. In a sharp,
+intuitive way Braceway felt that Bristow suspected his concern about
+George Withers. He did not know why he suspected it, but he did. He was
+convinced that the other, with his darting, analytical mind, had gone to
+the secret unerringly.
+
+"Oh, well," he laughed, rising from the table, "if you're so fond of your
+own ideas, Bristow, you won't be of much use to me in questioning Morley
+tonight."
+
+"On the contrary," the other returned quickly, "I'm just as anxious as
+you are to get the truth out of him. As long as one man's story is left
+vague and indefinite, just that long you run the risk of somebody's
+coming forward with facts or conjectures to overthrow the theory you've
+advanced. It applies to my idea as well as to yours."
+
+"No doubt."
+
+"You know as well as I do," the lame man continued, "that, if Perry
+Carpenter isn't guilty, the next one to suspect logically is Withers."
+
+"What makes you say that?" The question was put sharply.
+
+"I've two reasons. In the first place, the facts and Withers' own story;
+in the second, common sense."
+
+The telephone rang. When Bristow answered it, a man's voice asked for
+Braceway. Major Ross himself was on the wire.
+
+"I had the man in Baltimore interviewed," he reported. "Here is his story
+in a few words: some years ago Morley's father bought from his shop a
+pair of earrings, each one set with an unusually valuable pigeon's-blood
+ruby, and gave them to Mrs. Morley. Young Morley, now in trouble, took
+him this morning the two stones and asked him to buy them back. He
+explained that it must be done secretly because he might be suspected of
+having been implicated in a murder.
+
+"He denied any guilt, but said it would embarrass him if the deal became
+known. The owner of the shop--you understand who--could not buy them
+back, but promised to raise money on them, something he'd never done
+before. He was greatly affected by Morley's grief and despair. He says
+the rubies are the ones he sold years ago."
+
+"Did he raise the money?"
+
+"He tried, but couldn't get the sum Morley wanted, seven hundred dollars.
+Finally, he did advance it from his own pocket."
+
+"And the stones? How do they compare with those on the list of Withers'
+stuff?"
+
+"Identical."
+
+"All right; thanks. We'll see you at eight."
+
+Braceway repeated the report to Bristow, eliciting the comment:
+
+"Is somebody trying to make fun of us--or what is it? If those rubies
+belonged to Mrs. Withers, one thing at least is certain: Morley was in
+the bungalow the night of the murder, and after the murder had been
+committed. Miss Fulton distinctly told me the only jewelry that had ever
+passed between her and Morley was the ring found in his room in the
+Brevord that morning."
+
+Braceway laughed aloud.
+
+"At last," he said, "You're beginning to see the light--or to appreciate
+the jungle we're running around in."
+
+He had arranged for them to meet Major Ross at the station house of
+No. 7 police precinct. Since it was off the principal beats of police
+reporters, Morley was detained there.
+
+Bristow went into his bedroom, where Miss Martin gave him another dose of
+strychnine. He asked her to await his return--not that he expected to be
+in need of her, he said, but just to be on the safe side. He waved aside
+Braceway's solicitousness about his strength.
+
+As they stepped into the corridor, a boy handed Braceway a telegram. He
+read it, and, without a word, handed it to Bristow. It said:
+
+  "Two diamonds and two emeralds, unset, apparently part of Withers
+   jewelry, pawned here about two-thirty this afternoon by medium-sized
+   man; a little slim; black moustache; high, straight nose; bushy
+   eyebrows; very thin lips; gray eyes; age between thirty and forty;
+   weight 140 pounds. Two pawnshops used. No trace of him yet."
+
+It was signed by the chief of the Baltimore plain-clothes force.
+
+"What do you think of that?" asked Braceway, his voice hard.
+
+"This Morley," answered Bristow, his voice equally hard, "must have lost
+his mind."
+
+They went down and took a cab.
+
+"That description," the lame man was thinking, as they rolled through the
+streets toward the northwest part of the city, "fits Withers perfectly,
+except for the moustache and the colour of the eyes. But that's absurd.
+I'd like to----"
+
+He began again to wonder what, in addition to the capture of the guilty
+man, had brought Braceway to Washington. With his highly sensitized
+brain, he had received the impression that there was joined to the case
+some event or interest of which he had not the slightest inkling. How was
+Morley hooked up with the hidden phase of the affair? He intended to know
+all they knew about the whole business.
+
+If Morley knew the secret--there was Maria Fulton! Incredulous for a
+moment, he considered an entirely new idea. His incredulity vanished--and
+he knew!
+
+He lay back against the cab cushion and laughed, silently. His mirth
+grew. His laughter was almost beyond control. This was the thing that had
+bothered him, the "hidden angle" that had escaped him. He laughed until
+he shook. He had to put his hand to his mouth to prevent bursting into
+prolonged, riotous guffaws.
+
+That was it--Withers and Fulton, and Braceway of course, were afraid of
+Morley, afraid of what he might say; not about events of the night of
+the murder, but what he might reveal concerning----
+
+He struggled again with his consuming mirth. He saw now that he had
+handled everything exactly as it should have been handled.
+
+Now, more than ever before, he was interested in what the embezzler would
+say under their examination and cross-questioning. It was like a game in
+which he, Bristow, was the assured winner before even the first move was
+made. He knew already the very thing they were so intent on concealing.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+A CONFESSION
+
+
+Bristow, satisfied now that he had fathomed Braceway's reluctance to
+accept as final the case against Perry Carpenter, had not been the only
+one mystified by the detective's course. Practically every other
+detective and police official in the country was wondering what secret
+motive had impelled Braceway to keep public attention focused on the
+tragedy after a flawless case against the real murderer had been
+established.
+
+They knew that he was in the employ of the husband and father of the
+murdered woman, and that, therefore, his acts had the endorsement of her
+family. What, then, they asked, was the true situation back of the
+pursuit and persecution of the bank clerk, Henry Morley?
+
+What possible interest could they have in running him down, in ruining
+his standing? What contingency was powerful enough to compel their
+approval of Braceway's forcing the conclusion upon the mind of the public
+that an ugly scandal had touched Mrs. Withers?
+
+And this question, at first whispered in the gossip in Furmville, had
+crept into the newspaper dispatches. The result was a morbid curiosity
+generally, and, in the minds of many, a belief that Braceway would fasten
+the crime on Morley. There were, however, a few who took the position
+that Morley, even if he had not committed the murder, had knowledge of
+some fact or facts even more terrible than the crime itself.
+
+Major Ross awaited the two men in a large, bare-walled room on the second
+floor of the station house. The night was oppressively warm, and the
+tall, narrow windows were thrown open. Like Braceway, Bristow took off
+his coat, the absence of it showing plainly the outline of his heavy belt
+and steel brace.
+
+Morley was ushered in and given one of the plain, straight-backed chairs
+with which the room was furnished. The only other furniture was a deal
+table, behind which Braceway, Bristow, and Major Ross sat in lounging
+attitudes. The major, aside from his interest in the case, was there
+merely as a matter of courtesy, a compliment to Braceway's reputation.
+
+The prisoner, a few feet from them across the table, was suggestive of
+neither resistance nor mental alertness. Above his limp collar and
+loosened cravat, his face looked haggard and drawn. It was without a
+vestige of colour save for the blue shadows under his eyes. There was a
+tremor on his lips almost continuously.
+
+Once or twice throughout the whole interview, his eyes brightened
+momentarily with a hint of cunning or attempted cunning. Except for these
+few flashes, he was manifestly beaten, unnerved, suffering from a
+simultaneous desire and inability to weigh and ponder what he said.
+
+Braceway began, in quick, incisive sentences:
+
+"You're up against it, Morley. You know it as well as we do. And we don't
+want to trick you or bully you. We're only after the truth. If you'll
+tell the truth, it will help you and us. Will you give us a straight
+story?"
+
+"Yes," he answered dully, his hands folded, like a woman's, against his
+body.
+
+Braceway put more imperiousness into his voice.
+
+"You know you're under arrest for embezzlement, don't you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you did take money from the Anderson National Bank?"
+
+Morley squirmed and looked at each of the three in front of him before he
+replied to that.
+
+"Yes," he said finally, swallowing hard, his voice high and strained.
+
+"Good! That's the sensible way to look at it," Braceway jogged him with
+rapid speech. "We needn't bother any more about that tonight. How about
+the jewelry you pawned in Baltimore today?"
+
+The prisoner licked his lips and fixed on Braceway a look that grew into
+a stare.
+
+"You mean the rubies?"
+
+"Well, yes."
+
+"I didn't pawn them, and--and they were my mother's."
+
+"How about the diamonds and emeralds?"
+
+"I had no diamonds and emeralds."
+
+"You didn't! Where were you all the afternoon preceding the time you
+showed up at Eidstein's?"
+
+This was his first intimation that he had been watched. He hesitated.
+
+"Do I have to tell that?"
+
+"Certainly. Why shouldn't you?"
+
+A film, like tears, clouded his weak eyes. His voice was disagreeably
+beseeching.
+
+"It would bring my mother into this," he objected, twining his fingers
+about each other and shuffling his feet.
+
+"You'll have to tell us where you were and what you did," Braceway
+persisted.
+
+"Oh, very well," he said desperately; "I was in a room in the Emerson
+Hotel with--with my mother. And I was--I was confessing to her that I'd
+stolen from the bank. She knew I needed money. I had told her I'd been
+speculating, and needed some extra money for margins. She gave me the
+rubies from her earrings; and she followed me to Baltimore. If I couldn't
+raise the money on the rubies, she was to borrow it on our house. She
+owns that."
+
+He paused, on the verge of tears.
+
+"Buck up!" Braceway prodded him. "You confessed to her, did you?"
+
+"Yes. At the last, somehow, I couldn't stand the idea of her giving up
+the last thing she had, but--but she would have done it."
+
+"Could she have mortgaged her home in Baltimore?"
+
+"Yes. Mr. Taliaferro, A. G. Taliaferro, the lawyer, would have fixed it
+for her. He's a friend of the family--used to be of father's."
+
+"Now, about the emeralds and diamonds?" Braceway began another attack.
+
+"I don't know what you mean."'
+
+"They belonged to Mrs. Withers."
+
+Morley shook his head impatiently.
+
+"I don't know anything about them."
+
+Bristow took a hand in the questioning, flicking him and provoking him by
+tone and word. But neither he nor Braceway could get an admission, or any
+appearance of admission, that he knew anything about the Withers jewelry.
+
+Furthermore, he declared that his presence in the hotel, from the time
+Delaney had "lost" him until his second appearance at Eidstein's at four
+o'clock, could be established by the room clerk, two bellboys, and a maid
+at the Emerson, and by the lawyer, Taliaferro, with whom he had talked on
+the telephone while there with his mother.
+
+According to him, he had unwittingly evaded Delaney by the simple act of
+stepping into the elevator and going to the room where his mother, having
+reached Baltimore an hour later than he, was waiting to hear how he had
+fared in his interview with Eidstein.
+
+He had hoped, he said, to cover up the $700 shortage at the bank with the
+money obtained from the dealer in antiques, but, thinking of the risk of
+his mother's being impoverished, he had renounced at the last moment the
+plan of getting more money through the mortgage or sale of the home.
+
+"Do you happen to know that a man, clumsily disguised and answering to
+your description, pawned some of the Withers jewelry in Baltimore today?"
+Braceway asked.
+
+"Did he?" He looked blank.
+
+"Yes. What do you know about it?"
+
+"I've already told you: not a thing."
+
+Braceway, recognizing the futility for the present of prolonging this
+line of inquiry, paused, looking at him thoughtfully.
+
+"If I pawned them," Morley added, without raising his eyes, "why wasn't
+the money found on me?"
+
+"Don't get too smart!" Bristow put in so roughly and suddenly that the
+prisoner started violently. "What we want is facts, not arguments!"
+
+The lame man leaned forward in his chair and made his voice sharp,
+provocative.
+
+"You're not as clever as you think you are. You lied when you made your
+statement about the night Mrs. Withers was murdered. Now, come through
+with that--the truth about it!"
+
+Morley, utterly bewildered, stared and said nothing.
+
+"What did you do that night? Where were you?"
+
+Bristow left his chair and, going round the table, stood in front of
+Morley.
+
+"I told you that once. I wasn't anywhere near Manniston Road."
+
+"Yes, you were! We've got proof of it. You _were_ there!"
+
+"What proof?"
+
+"You're curious about that, are you? I thought you would be! For one
+thing, the imprint of your rubber shoe on the porch floor of Number
+Five--"
+
+"No! No! I wasn't on the porch. I----" He checked the words, realizing
+that he had betrayed himself.
+
+"Not on the porch?" Bristow caught him up. "Where, then? Where?" He
+limped a step nearer to the prisoner. "Out with it now! You _were_
+there! You were there!"
+
+He stood over Morley, conquering him by the sheer weight of his
+personality.
+
+"I wasn't on the porch."
+
+"All right--not on the porch. But where?"
+
+Morley looked up at him and, mechanically, pushed his chair back, as if
+he felt the need of more space. Bristow, in his shirt-sleeves, his right
+arm held up, continued to crowd against him, threatening him, commanding
+him to speak.
+
+Braceway was amazed by the intensity of Bristow's glance, the tautness
+of his body, the harsh authority in his voice. This man who had been ill
+a few hours before exhibited now a strength and a vitality that would
+have been remarkable in anybody. In him, under the circumstances, it was
+nothing short of marvellous.
+
+Morley could not withstand him.
+
+"I don't know anything--anything worth while," he said weakly, trembling
+from head to foot. "I would have told it at the very--at the very first;
+only I thought it might keep me in Furmville too long. I wanted to get
+back here and----"
+
+"Never mind about what you wanted!" Bristow's hand fell and gripped his
+shoulder painfully, shook him, brought him back to the main issue. "What
+did you see? That's what we want to know, every bit of it, all of it!"
+
+Morley flinched, trying to throw off Bristow's hand. The lame man stepped
+back.
+
+"All right," he said, "I'm not going to hurt you."
+
+Morley, having yielded, told his story hurriedly, with little pauses here
+and there, struggling for breath.
+
+"I did miss my train, the midnight," he began. "I really tried to catch
+it. But, when I found it was gone, I couldn't sleep. I was worried and
+frightened. This bank business was on my mind. I wanted to think." He
+forced a mirthless smile at that. "I couldn't think very straight, but
+I tried to. I couldn't do anything but see myself in jail, in the
+penitentiary, because of the bank.
+
+"I wandered around without paying any attention to where I was. I'd left
+my bags in the station. The first thing I knew, I was on Manniston Road,
+in front of Number Nine--your house. I felt tired, and I sat down on the
+bottom step. I had on a raincoat. It--it was pitch-dark there.
+
+"The two electric lights, the street lights, on that block were out--had
+burnt out, or something. The only light I could see was down at the
+corner, where Manniston Road goes into Freeman Avenue--and that didn't
+give any light where I was."
+
+"That's true," Bristow said sharply, "but, from where you sat, anybody
+going up or down the steps of Number Five would have been directly
+between you and the avenue light. Isn't that so?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"All right--go ahead. What did you see?"
+
+Morley hitched back his chair still further. He had begun to perspire,
+and he kept running his fingers round his neck between flesh and collar.
+
+"It was raining," he went on, his voice strained and metallic, "a fine
+drizzle at that time, and this made a circle of light, a kind of bright
+screen around the avenue light. Things that happened on, or near, the
+steps of Number Five were silhouetted against that screen of light.
+
+"I'd been there just a little while when I noticed some kind of movement
+on the steps of Number Five. It was a man coming down the steps. He was
+very careful about it, and very slow; looked like a man on his tiptoes."
+
+Bristow maintained his attitude of hanging over him, urging him on,
+forcing him to talk. Braceway and Major Ross, their faces wearing
+strained expressions, bent forward in their chairs, catching every
+syllable that came from the prisoner.
+
+"He went down the steps and turned down Manniston Road, toward the
+avenue."
+
+"All right!" Bristow prompted. "What then?"
+
+"That was all there was to that. I just sat there. It looked funny to me,
+but I didn't follow him. I wondered what he'd been doing. I never thought
+about murder or--or anything like that. I swear I didn't!"
+
+He licked his lips and gulped.
+
+"I sat there, I don't know how much longer it was--pretty long, I
+suppose. I didn't keep my glance always toward Number Five.
+
+"When I did look that way again, I saw another man come down the steps
+quietly, very cautiously. He turned toward me, but he came only far
+enough up to cut in between Number Five and Number Seven. He disappeared
+that way, between the two houses."
+
+"Did you see the struggle?" Braceway asked sharply.
+
+Bristow scowled at the interruption.
+
+"What struggle?" Morley retorted, vacant eyes turned toward Braceway.
+
+"You know! The struggle between two men at the foot of the steps of
+Number Five."
+
+"I didn't see a struggle," said Morley. "There wasn't any."
+
+"You might as well tell it straight now as later. Give me the truth about
+that struggle. Were you in it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Now, see here! We know such a struggle occurred. If you were there, as
+you say you were, you must have seen it. You couldn't have helped seeing
+it!"
+
+Morley denied it again, and his denial stood against all of Braceway's
+skill. There had been no struggle, no encounter of any two persons. He
+clung to that without qualification.
+
+Bristow knew how great Braceway's disappointment was. He was convinced
+that Braceway, in coming to Washington, had looked forward to securing
+a confirmation of Withers' story. Now, instead of corroboration, he got
+only a flat and unshaken contradiction.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+ON THE RACK
+
+
+Braceway waved his hand carelessly, relinquishing the post of questioner.
+Bristow took command again.
+
+"What did you do after you saw the second man?"
+
+"At first, I sat still. After a while, not very long, it occurred to me
+that the two women in Number Five might be in danger. I say it occurred
+to me, but I didn't really think so.
+
+"I walked down to the bungalow, but I couldn't hear any noise, couldn't
+see any light. Finally, I went up to the head of the steps and listened,
+but there wasn't a sound. Then I went back to the hotel--no; I went first
+to the station, got my grips, and then went to the hotel."
+
+"Didn't murder or robbery occur to you when you saw those two men on the
+steps?"
+
+"Well--no; I can't say either occurred to me."
+
+"What did, then?"
+
+"I knew Withers had visited his wife unexpectedly once or twice before,
+late at night."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I don't know. I thought he was jealous, suspicious."
+
+"And you also thought these two men you saw were Withers?"
+
+"They might have been one man, the same man," Morley advanced the
+supposition wearily. The tremor of his hands had gone into his arms; they
+jerked every few moments. "I saw them at different times.
+
+"I couldn't see that clearly. But--but I think the first one wore a long
+raincoat, or else he was heavily built. Hearing about the negro the next
+day, I thought the first figure I'd seen must have been the negro's. The
+second didn't look very different. He might have had a beard; perhaps, he
+was a little slenderer. Those are the only differences I remember."
+
+"Did the second wear a raincoat?"
+
+"I thought so."
+
+"And the first had no beard?"
+
+"He might have, but I don't think so."
+
+Bristow paused long enough to let the silence become impressive. Then he
+broke the stillness with a voice that cracked sharp as a revolver shot.
+
+"Well! What about the struggle at the foot of the steps?"
+
+Morley, startled by the unexpected abruptness, answered shakily.
+
+"I tell you I--I didn't see any struggle. That man, or those men, tried
+not to make any noise at all. He thought nobody saw him."
+
+Braceway took a hand again in the examination, but their combined efforts
+got nothing further from the tired prisoner.
+
+They tried to shake him with the accusation that he had entered the
+bungalow Monday night; they told him also they might take him back to
+Furmville at once, charged with the murder.
+
+"It wouldn't make any difference to me," he said, making a weak attempt
+to laugh. "It wouldn't matter now. I'm not anxious to live anyhow."
+
+Without warning, utter collapse struck him. He flung himself half-around
+on his chair so that his arms rested on its back, cradling his face. His
+body was contorted by gasping sobs, and his feet tapped the floor with
+the rapidity of those of a man running at top speed.
+
+They left him with Major Ross. On the way back to the hotel, Bristow
+asked:
+
+"What about Withers' story of his struggle--the 'big, strong man' who
+flung him down the walk?"
+
+"There must have been another, a third man who came down the steps,"
+Braceway answered quietly.
+
+"An assumption," observed Bristow, "which rather strains my credulity."
+
+Braceway said nothing.
+
+"I believe," Bristow spoke up again, "what the fellow said tonight was
+true--substantially true."
+
+"Do you?" retorted Braceway, thoroughly non-committal.
+
+"Anyway there remains the problem of who pawned the Withers emeralds and
+diamonds this afternoon."
+
+"It may not be a problem," said Braceway. "It may be that they weren't
+the Withers stuff at all."
+
+"Ah! I hadn't thought of that."
+
+They entered the hotel and sat down in the lobby, now almost deserted.
+
+"I think," Bristow announced, careful to keep any note of triumph out of
+his voice, "I'll go back to Furmville in the morning." He yawned and
+stretched himself. "I'm about all in, weak as a kitten. What are you
+planning?"
+
+Braceway's chin was thrust forward. He looked belligerent, angry.
+
+"I'm going to Baltimore tomorrow. I intend to run down every clue I have
+or can find. I'm going to take up every statement he made tonight and
+dissect it--every point. I want all the facts--all of them."
+
+Bristow turned so as to face him squarely.
+
+"Why don't you go back with me? Why keep on fighting what I've proved?
+I think I know why you came to Washington. It wasn't your belief in
+Morley's guilt. It was your desire to clear Withers. But you know as well
+as I do that Withers isn't guilty. So, why worry?"
+
+Braceway sprang to his feet.
+
+"Morley isn't out of the woods yet," he said grimly. "This case isn't
+settled yet, by a long shot. I'm going to stick right here."
+
+He made no reference to Withers.
+
+Bristow went to his room, paid and dismissed Miss Martin, and began to
+undress. He was more than satisfied with everything that had happened.
+He had bested Braceway again, this time finally; his reputation as a
+"consulting detective" was more than safe; and, knowing now why Braceway
+had pursued Morley, he would return to Furmville in the morning, his mind
+thoroughly at ease.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+MISS FULTON WRITES A LETTER
+
+
+As long as the public's morbid curiosity clamoured for details of the
+case, the newspapers provided them lavishly. This curiosity was
+intensified by two things: first, the search for a murderer after so much
+almost convincing evidence had been found against the negro, and, second,
+the duel between Bristow, the amateur, and Braceway, the professional,
+each bent on making his theory "stand up." The amateur had achieved far
+more celebrity than he had expected.
+
+It would have been hard to find two men less alike than he and Braceway.
+Bristow was capable now and then of manifesting the strength and
+impressive authority he had exhibited in his questioning of Morley.
+Braceway, on the other hand, was always keyed up, dashing, imperious. And
+he had a kindness of heart, a very live tenderness, such as the lame man
+never displayed.
+
+Braceway was of the tribe of dreamers.
+
+He had learned that no man may hope to be a great detective unless he
+has imagination, unless he can throw into the dark places which always
+surround a mysterious crime the luminous and golden glow of fancy. He had
+found also that, if a man's vocabulary is without a "perhaps" or a "but
+why couldn't it be the other way?" he will never be able to judge human
+nature or to consider fairly every side of any question.
+
+He discussed these views at breakfast with Bristow, who was interested
+only in his own decision of the night before to return at once to
+Furmville.
+
+"My health demands it," he said; "and I can't convince myself that either
+you or I can dig up anything here to affect the final outcome of the
+case."
+
+"You're right about the health part of it; I'm not sure about the other,"
+said Braceway.
+
+"What are you after, though?" Bristow pressed him.
+
+"Facts. That bearded man with the gold tooth, the fellow who always
+started from nowhere and invariably vanished into thin air--I don't
+propose to assume that he had nothing to do with the murder of Enid
+Withers. I don't intend to be recorded as not having combed the country
+for him if necessary.
+
+"That disguised man is no myth. And Morley knows all about beard
+'make-up.' His note to me in Furmville proved that. The negro boy, Roddy,
+swears Morley and the mysterious stranger are the same.
+
+"There isn't a crook living who can put it over on me this way with a
+cheap disguise. And this case isn't cleared up until, in some way, I find
+out who he is or get my hands on him." His voice was vibrant with the
+intensity of his feeling. "I'm going to find him! I intend to answer, to
+my own satisfaction, two questions."
+
+"What are they?"
+
+"The first is: was the bearded man Morley? The second: if Morley wasn't
+the bearded man, who was?"
+
+"But, if you do find this hirsute individual, what then? What becomes of
+the unassailable evidence against the negro?"
+
+"That will come later. Today I'm going to Baltimore. I've a report
+already, this morning, from Platt. He went over there last night. Morley,
+I find, deceived us again last night. He said nothing of leaving the
+hotel to call on the lawyer, Taliaferro.
+
+"As a matter of fact, he did visit Taliaferro.
+
+"He called the lawyer on the telephone at twenty minutes past two and
+said he would go at once to his office. If he had done so, he would have
+arrived there at twenty-four minutes past two. He reached there, in fact,
+at two-fifty, ten minutes of three. A half-hour of his time isn't
+accounted for. He left the hotel at two-twenty-one. Where did he spend
+that last half-hour? It's an interesting point."
+
+"Yes," Bristow said, surprised. "Pawnshops?"
+
+"Perhaps--two pawnshops."
+
+"And the pawned diamonds and emeralds are certainly the Withers stuff, a
+part of it?"
+
+"I'm sure of it."
+
+"Anyway you look at it," Bristow smiled pleasantly, his manner tinged
+with patronizing, "you've a hard job to get away with."
+
+"If," the other ruminated, "the jewels pawned yesterday were not Mrs.
+Withers', why wouldn't the man who pawned them come forward and say so?
+If there wasn't anything crooked about them, why should he hide himself?
+The papers are full of it this morning. It's public property."
+
+Bristow, looking at his watch, saw that it was nine o'clock and time for
+him to go to the railroad station.
+
+They said good-bye, each confident that the other was on the wrong trail.
+
+"I'm leaving you," the lame man declared, "to run to your heart's content
+around the clever circles you've outlined, and to beat off the newspaper
+reporters."
+
+"It's not for long," Braceway returned seriously. "I hope to be in
+Furmville next week with an armful of new facts. I'll see you then."
+
+He went to the desk and got his mail. In addition to reports from his
+Atlanta office, there was one letter in a big, square envelope. He
+recognized the writing and opened that first.
+
+"Dear Mr. Braceway," it said: "I hope Mr. Bristow repeated to you
+everything I told him. He is quite brilliant, I have no doubt, but I
+talked to him in the belief and hope that he would tell you everything.
+I know what you can do, and I trust you more than I do him. You see, you
+have successes behind you.
+
+"If he did not tell you all, I shall be glad to do so at any time."
+
+It was signed, "Sincerely yours, Maria Fulton."
+
+He read the note twice. When he put it into his pocket, there was a new
+light in his eyes, and at the corners of his mouth a relaxation of the
+lines of sternness.
+
+"I wonder----" he began in his thoughts, and added: "Some other time,
+perhaps. No; surely. I always knew her better than she knew herself."
+
+He was frankly happy, felt himself uplifted, freshened in spirit.
+Standing there in the crowded lobby, with people brushing past him and
+jogging his elbow, he flashed back two years in memory to the evening
+when he had warned her not to let the sweetness of her personality be
+overshadowed by her sister. It was then that he had insisted on her
+living her own life instead of giving up to the wishes of others always.
+
+She had misconstrued it, deciding that he was disappointed in her. She
+said his love for her had lessened, and therefore their engagement was a
+great mistake.
+
+Then came her promise to marry Morley, a promise made in pique.
+Afterwards she had done everything possible to show the world she had
+chosen a man instead of a weakling. This, Braceway knew, was why she had
+advanced him money, bolstering up one mistake with another. It was why
+she had listened to his stories of getting great wealth, if only he had a
+small amount of money to start on!
+
+What a fiasco the whole thing had been, what bitter disappointment and
+sorrow! And yet, she had been fortunate in discovering now what he was.
+
+There was no doubt about it, Braceway decided; she had loved him,
+Braceway, all this time. In a few days he would tell her so, make her
+confess it. He would compel her to listen to what he had to say; he would
+never again jeopardize their happiness by allowing her to misunderstand
+him.
+
+He crossed the lobby with long, springy strides. He felt that he could
+encounter no obstacle too great for him to overcome. Failure could not
+touch him.
+
+He left the hotel and went to Golson's office. He had much to do in
+Baltimore--and elsewhere.
+
+Hurrying to the station after a brief conference with Golson, he wondered
+why he had heard nothing from Withers. What was the matter with George
+anyhow? Why hadn't he acknowledged the telegram of yesterday? Couldn't he
+realize, without being told, that he might be charged with the murder at
+any moment?
+
+Braceway was as well aware as Bristow of the rising flood of criticism
+against Withers.
+
+"If I can't bring things to a last show-down within a day or two," he
+looked the situation squarely in the face, "it will be uncomfortable for
+him--emphatically uncomfortable."
+
+He turned to a study of the questions he wanted to put to Eidstein, this
+kindly old merchant who was so considerate, so handsomely considerate,
+about buying back jewels he had once sold. Mr. Eidstein, he felt sure,
+must be an interesting character.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A MYSTIFYING TELEGRAM
+
+
+Reaching Furmville early Sunday morning, Bristow went straight to his
+bungalow, where Mattie had breakfast waiting for him.
+
+"You is sholy some big man now, Mistuh Bristow!" she informed him. "Sence
+you been gawn, folks done made it a habit to drive by hyuh jes' foh de
+chanct uv seem' you."
+
+Before the day was over, he found that this was true. And he liked it. He
+spent a great deal of his time on the front porch, finding it far from
+unpleasant to be regarded as a second Sherlock Holmes.
+
+Late in the afternoon his Cincinnati friend, Overton, called on him,
+puffing and gasping for breath as he climbed the steps. Bristow was glad
+to see him; it afforded him an opportunity to discuss his success. He did
+not try to delude himself in that regard; he was proud of what he had
+accomplished--rightfully proud, he told himself--and pleased with his
+plans for the future.
+
+"Gee whiz!" the fat man panted. "This hill is something fierce. It's only
+your sudden dash into the limelight that drags me up here."
+
+"You behold"--Bristow softened his statement with a deprecating
+laugh--"Mr. Lawrence Bristow, a finished, honest-to-heaven detective,
+a criminologist."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I'm going to make it my profession. I'm starting out as a professional
+detective."
+
+Overton burst into bubbling laughter.
+
+"That's rich!" he exclaimed. "You'd never in the world make good at it.
+Why, Bristow, you're lame; you've a crooked nose; that heavy, overhanging
+lip of yours--those things would enable any crook to spot you a mile
+off." He laughed again. "I'd like to see you shadowing some foxy
+second-story worker!"
+
+"I said 'a consulting detective'," Bristow corrected him. "That shadowing
+business is for the hired man, the square-toed, bull-necked cops. I'll
+work only as the directing head, the brains of the investigations."
+
+"Oh, that's different," said Overton, at once conciliatory. "That's
+nearer real sense. Big money in it, isn't there?"
+
+"Yes. I'm not an eleemosynary institution yet."
+
+Overton mopped his fat cheeks.
+
+"Ah, me!" he sighed. "We never know what's ahead of us, do we? A year ago
+you were dubbing around in Cincinnati trying to sell real estate and
+working out crime problems on paper--and here you are now, a big man.
+It's hard to believe."
+
+"It is, however, a very acceptable fact."
+
+"No doubt, no doubt," assented the fat man.
+
+On Overton's heels came the chief of police. After getting a minute
+recital of what had happened in Washington and Baltimore, he agreed that
+Braceway was only setting up straw men for the pleasure of knocking them
+down.
+
+"Even if there is something mysterious in Morley's conduct, in what
+occurred in Baltimore," said the chief, "it can't do away with the
+open-and-shut fact that Perry did the murder."
+
+"Of course," Bristow commented. "But what's the news with you?"
+
+"For one thing, Perry gave us last night what he calls a confession. In
+it he says he did tell Lucy Thomas he knew where he could get money 'or
+something just as good'; he did go to Number Five in a more or less
+drunken condition; and he got as far as the front door.
+
+"There, he says, he thought he heard a noise across the road from him,
+and he lost his nerve. He tiptoed down the steps and went away, passing
+in between Number Five and Number Seven. He ran all the way back to
+Lucy's house, threw down the key he had got from her, and then went
+to his own rooming-house. He says he stayed there the rest of the night."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"That's all."
+
+"How about the lavalliere? Wasn't it found under his window? The papers
+said so."
+
+"Yes; in the grass in the yard. But he denies knowing anything about it."
+
+"Of course! And his confession is nothing but a confirmation of the case
+against him."
+
+"Exactly. He seems to want to hang himself. And he'll do it. The grand
+jury meets next Thursday. He'll be indicted then, and tried two weeks
+later."
+
+"What are the people here saying about Braceway's bitterness against
+Morley? Anything?"
+
+"Yes. I'd meant to tell you about that. Some of the gossip hits Withers
+pretty hard. They can't understand what's behind this persecution of
+Morley after it's been proved that Perry did the murder. You've seen
+hints of it in the papers.
+
+"And it looks queer. Some say Withers is guilty, out-and-out guilty, and
+afraid the case against Perry won't hold good. So, they say, he wants to
+get a case against Morley."
+
+"A sort of second line of defense?"
+
+"I reckon so. But, then, there are others saying right now that Morley
+was mixed up in some sort of scandal for which Withers wants revenge.
+That's what you said at the very start. Remember?"
+
+Bristow laughed softly.
+
+"Yes; I had that idea, and I've reasoned it out. On the way to
+Washington, and after we got there, I saw that Braceway wasn't entirely
+frank with me. You know how a man can feel a thing like that. He gets it
+by intuition.
+
+"And it worried me. Having handled the case here, I didn't want him to
+spring some brand new angle which possibly, in some way, might make me
+look like a fool.
+
+"I puzzled over the thing a whole lot. What was it he was after without
+letting me in on it? The night we talked to Morley in the station house,
+I got it. We were in a cab at the time, a lucky thing, because, when it
+burst upon me, I narrowly escaped hysterics. The thing came to me like an
+inspiration.
+
+"Braceway was afraid Morley knew something detrimental to Withers and
+would spring it under questioning. Understand now: it wasn't directly
+connected with the murder, but something that would make it pretty hot
+for Withers. And here was the laugh: while Morley didn't know it, I did.
+Braceway had made the trip to gag Morley, to see that he didn't uncover
+something which, after all, Morley didn't know--and I did!
+
+"It was this: about nine months ago Mrs. Withers, while in Washington,
+got a lawyer, the firm of Dutton & Dutton, to draw up for her the
+necessary papers for suing Withers for a divorce. In these documents she
+set forth in so many words that her husband had treated her with the
+utmost brutality, so much so that she lived daily in danger of death
+while under his roof.
+
+"She regarded him, she swore, as capable of murdering her at any time.
+Now, do you see? If that had gotten into the newspapers, if Morley had
+known of it through Maria Fulton and had blurted it out, no power on
+earth could have kept down the very reasonable assumption that Withers
+had had a hand in his wife's death--or, at least, had regarded it with
+complaisance.
+
+"No wonder I laughed, was it? But I said nothing about it to Braceway. I
+couldn't have explained to him how I knew it, although the tip came to me
+straight enough. And, as there's no earthly chance of Withers having been
+implicated in the crime, why worry about it?
+
+"I merely laughed and--kept quiet."
+
+Greenleaf had listened in great solemnity to this amusing recital.
+
+"Maybe you're right," he said. "But Withers has done some funny things."
+
+"What things?"
+
+"His wife was buried in Atlanta Thursday morning. He immediately left
+Atlanta, and hasn't been seen or heard of since--a sharp contrast to old
+Fulton. He got back here early Friday morning and came up to Number Five.
+They're going to keep that bungalow."
+
+"When did Withers leave Atlanta?"
+
+"Thursday morning, right after the funeral. Another thing: he's heels
+over head in debt."
+
+"Well, what about it? What are you driving at?" Bristow asked,
+perceptibly irritable.
+
+"I'm not driving at anything. What's it to us anyway? It stimulates this
+ugly talk. That's all."
+
+Bristow was doing some quick thinking. If Withers had left Atlanta
+early Thursday morning, he might have reached Washington by Friday
+afternoon--and gone to Baltimore! But did he? And did Braceway know of it
+and keep it to himself?
+
+He recalled that Braceway, during their breakfast together in Washington,
+had said:
+
+"Get one thing straight in your mind, Bristow. Any man I find mixed up in
+this murder I'm going to turn over to the police. If I thought George
+Withers had killed his wife, I'd hand him over so fast it would make your
+head swim. You may not believe that, but I would--in a second!"
+
+Had that been a prophecy? Was Withers in Baltimore at two-thirty Friday
+afternoon? Could he have been fool enough to pawn anything? Or did he go
+there in the hope of incriminating Morley further? All these things were
+within the realm of possibility, but hardly credible. Braceway might have
+known of them, and he might not.
+
+Abrahamson, he remembered, had put it into Braceway's head, against
+Braceway's own desire, that the man with the gold tooth and Withers
+resembled each other. But nobody believed that. It would be futile to
+consider it.
+
+The chief, as if reading his thoughts, gave more information:
+
+"Abrahamson, the loan-shark, came to my office yesterday; wanted to know
+where he could reach Braceway by wire. He evidently knew something and
+wouldn't tell me. Said he wired yesterday morning to Braceway in
+Washington, but the telegraph company reported 'no delivery'--couldn't
+locate him. I wonder what the Jew knows."
+
+"It's too much for me." Bristow dismissed the question carelessly, but
+immediately flared up peevishly: "What's getting into these fellows? They
+act like fools, each of them, Morley and Withers, following Perry's lead
+and trying to have themselves arrested! But Braceway--if he wasn't in
+Washington, he must be on his way back here. We'll soon have his last say
+on the case."
+
+"All the same," said Greenleaf, "if I were in that husband's place, I'd
+stay away from here. The talk's too bitter; worse here among the
+Manniston Road people than anywhere else."
+
+"Well, what of it?"
+
+"It wouldn't be the first instance of how easy it is for an innocent man
+to be--well, hurt."
+
+"Oh, that sort of thing is out of the question, absurd."
+
+"Never mind! I'd stay away. That's what I'd do."
+
+It was almost dark when the chief of police took his departure. Bristow
+sat watching the last crimson light fade over the mountains. The dim
+electric, a poor excuse for a street lamp, had flashed on in front of
+No. 4. The shadows grew deeper and deeper; there was no breeze; the oaks
+along the roadside and in the backyards became still, black plumes above
+the bungalows.
+
+Manniston Road was wrapped in darkness. The silence was broken, even at
+this early hour, only by the distant, faint screech of street-car wheels
+against the rails, or the far sound of an automobile horn down in the
+town, or the rattle of a sick man's cough on one of the sleeping porches.
+There was something uncanny, Bristow thought, in the velvet blackness and
+the heavy silence.
+
+He got up and went into the living room, turning on the lights. The
+night, the stillness, had affected him. Perhaps, he thought, Withers
+after all would do well to give Furmville a wide berth. If disorganized
+rumour grew into positive accusation----
+
+And what of himself, Bristow? He had run down the guilty man, had
+discovered and hooked together the facts that made retribution almost an
+accomplished thing. Could he have been mistaken, entirely wrong? Would
+public opinion turn also against him and say he had enmeshed an innocent
+negro instead of bringing to punishment a jealousy-maddened husband?
+
+Was there a chance that, in condemning Withers, they would destroy his
+reputation for brilliant work?
+
+Pshaw! He shrugged his shoulders. He was worse than the gossiping women,
+letting himself conjure up weird and incredible ideas. There was not a
+weak place, not an illogical point, in the case he had disclosed against
+Carpenter. He had won. His prestige was assured. Far from questioning his
+work, they ought to thank him for----
+
+The reverie was interrupted by the telephone bell. He took down the
+receiver and shouted "Hello!" as if he resented the call. His irritation
+showed what a tremendous amount of nervous energy he had expended in the
+last six days.
+
+"Western Union speaking," said a man's voice. "Telegram for Mr. Lawrence
+Bristow, nine Manniston Road."
+
+"All right. This is Bristow. Read it to me."
+
+"Message is dated today, Washington, D. C.--'Mr. Lawrence Bristow, nine
+Manniston Road, Furmville, N. C. See Encyclopaedia Britannica, volume
+one, page five hundred and six, second column, line fifteen to line
+seventeen, and page five hundred and seven, second column, line seventeen
+to line twenty-three.' Signed 'S. S. Braceway,' Do you get that?"
+
+"No! Wait a minute," he called out sharply. "Let me get a pencil and take
+it down."
+
+He did so, verifying the numbers by having the operator repeat the
+message a third time. When he had hung up the receiver, he sat staring at
+what he had written. It was like so much Greek to him.
+
+"What's it all about?" he puzzled. "Is it one of Braceway's jokes?"
+
+Then he remembered that Braceway was not that kind of a joker. He looked
+at his watch. He had no encyclopaedia, and it was now a quarter to
+eleven, too late to ring up anybody and ask the absurd favour of having
+extracts from an encyclopaedia read to him over the telephone. Besides,
+it might be something he would prefer to keep to himself.
+
+He would wait until morning and go to the public library where he could
+look up the references with no questions asked. He was annoyed by the
+necessity of delay, angry with Braceway. He studied the numbers again,
+and allowed himself the rare luxury of an outburst of vari-coloured
+profanity.
+
+The idea uppermost in his mind was that the telegram had to do with
+Withers--or could it be something about Morley?
+
+In his bed on the sleeping porch, he looked out at the black plumes of
+the trees. The silence seemed now neither sinister nor oppressive. All
+that was sinister was in the past; had ended the night of the murder; and
+Carpenter would go to the chair for it--sure.
+
+And yet, if he were Withers, he would not come back to Manniston Road.
+Nobody could foresee what Braceway might imagine and exaggerate, even
+if it indicted and condemned his closest friend.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+WANTED: VENGEANCE
+
+
+But the next morning was the crowded beginning of the biggest day in
+Bristow's life, and the trip to the library was delayed. The hired
+automobile was waiting in front of No. 9 when a second telegram came,
+a bulky dispatch, scrawled with a pen across several pages. Dated from
+New Orleans, it read:
+
+  "Reward of five thousand dollars for discovery of my seven-year-old son
+   within next six days. Kidnapped last Friday night. No clue so far. Am
+   most anxious for your help. Will pay you two thousand dollars and
+   expenses and in addition to that will pay you the reward money if you
+   are successful. Will pay the two thousand whether you succeed or not.
+   City and state authorities will give you all the help needed. Come at
+   once if possible. Wire answer.
+
+  (Signed) "Emile Loutois."
+
+It was characteristic of Bristow that he was not particularly surprised
+or elated by the request for his services. It was the kind of thing he
+had foreseen as a result of the advertising he had received.
+
+He made his decision at once. For the past two days the Loutois
+kidnapping had commanded big space in the newspapers, and he was familiar
+with the story. Emile Loutois, Jr., young son of the wealthiest sugar
+planter in Louisiana, had been spirited away from the pavement in front
+of his home. It had been done at twilight with striking boldness, and no
+dependable trace of the kidnappers had been found.
+
+The delivery boy was waiting on the porch. Bristow typewrote his reply on
+a sheet of note paper:
+
+  "Terms accepted. Starting for New Orleans at once."
+
+On his way to the door, he stopped and reflected. He went back to the
+typewriter and sat down. He had not yet found out the real meaning of the
+Braceway message; and he did not propose to leave Furmville until he was
+assured that nothing could be done to blur the brightness of his work on
+the Withers case.
+
+He realized, and at the same time resented, the tribute he paid Braceway
+through his hesitancy. The man was a clever detective and, if left to
+dominate Greenleaf unopposed, might easily focus attention on a new
+theory of the crime. Not that this could result in the acquittal of the
+negro; but it might deprive him, Bristow, of the credit he was now given.
+
+Wouldn't it be well for him to stay in Furmville another twenty-four
+hours? There was Fulton; he wanted to learn how fully he approved of
+Braceway's refusal to accept the case against Perry Carpenter. Moreover,
+it seemed essential now that he discover the whereabouts of Withers. And
+twenty-four hours could hardly change anything in the kidnapping case.
+
+He tore up what he had written, and rattled off:
+
+  "Held here twenty-four hours longer by Withers case. Start to New
+   Orleans tomorrow morning. Terms accepted."
+
+As he handed it to the boy, he saw Mr. Fulton coming up the steps. He
+greeted the old gentleman with easy, smiling cordiality and pushed
+forward a chair for him, giving no sign of impatience at being delayed
+in his trip to the library.
+
+The simple dignity and strength of Fulton's bearing was even more
+impressive than it had been during their first talk. The lines were still
+deep in his face, but his eyes glowed splendidly, and this time, when he
+rested his hands on the chair-arms, they were steady.
+
+"I've come to beg news," he announced, his apologetic smile very winning.
+
+"Just what news?" returned Bristow. "I'll be glad to give you anything I
+can."
+
+"The real results of your trip; that's what I'd like to know about. I got
+no letter or telegram from Sam Braceway this morning; no report at all."
+
+Bristow told him the story in generous detail, concluding with his
+conviction that Morley, although a thorough scoundrel, was innocent of
+any hand in the murder.
+
+"I wish I could agree with you," said the old man. "I wish we all could
+satisfy our minds and take the evidence against the negro as final. But
+we can't. At least, I can't. I can't believe anything but that the
+disguised man, the one with the beard, is the one we've got to find."
+
+"You still think that man is Morley?"
+
+"I do--which reminds me. I came up here to tell you something I got from
+Maria, my daughter. She told me she had talked with you quite frankly.
+Well, she recalls that once she and this Morley were discussing the
+wearing of beards and moustaches; and he made this remark: 'One thing
+about a beard, it's the best disguise possible.'"
+
+"That is interesting, Mr. Fulton. Anything else?"
+
+"Yes. He had a good deal to say to that general effect. He said even a
+moustache, cleverly worn, changed a man's whole expression. That struck
+me at once, remembering that the jewels were pawned in Baltimore by a man
+who wore a moustache. Then, too, Morley said something about the value of
+eyebrows in a disguise, substituting bushy ones for thin ones, or vice
+versa. He had the whole business at his tongue's end."
+
+"He said all that, in what connection--crime?"
+
+"She can't recall that. She merely remembers he said it. I thought you'd
+like to know of it."
+
+"Of course. We can't have too many facts. By the way, sir, can you tell
+me where Mr. Withers is?"
+
+"In Atlanta."
+
+Seeing that he knew nothing of his son-in-law's disappearance, Bristow
+dropped the subject, and asked:
+
+"What is Miss Fulton's belief now? She still thinks Morley is the man?"
+
+The old man hitched his chair closer to Bristow's and lowered his voice.
+
+"She says a curious thing, Mr. Bristow. She declares that, if Morley
+isn't guilty, George Withers is."
+
+"And you?"
+
+"Oh, the talk about George is absurd."
+
+"But," urged Bristow, his smile persuasive, "for the sake of argument, if
+circumstances pointed to him as----"
+
+"I'd spend every dollar I have, use the last atom of my strength, to send
+him to the chair! No suffering, no torture, would be too much for him--if
+that's what you mean to ask me. If I even suspected him, I'd subject him
+to an inquiry more relentless, more searching, more merciless than I'd
+use with anybody else!"
+
+His nostrils expanded curiously. His eyes flamed.
+
+"Mr. Bristow," he continued, menace in his low tone, "no punishment ever
+devised by man could be sufficient to pay for, to atone for, the horror,
+the enormity, of the destruction of such a woman as my daughter was.
+Mercy? I'd show him no mercy if he lived a thousand years!"
+
+"I understand your feeling," Bristow said. "You're perfectly right, of
+course. And what I was leading up to is this: although we know that the
+idea of Withers' guilt is absurd, he's being made to suffer. You've seen
+intimations, almost direct statements, in the newspapers. People are
+talking disagreeably.
+
+"They're saying that Braceway, employed by you and Withers, is
+persecuting this bank thief in the hope of building up the murder charge,
+so that, if the case against Carpenter falls down, Morley will be the
+logical man to be put on trial. You see?"
+
+"No," Fulton said; "I don't. What do you mean?"
+
+"That you, Withers, and Braceway are afraid Withers may be accused of the
+murder."
+
+"Ah! They're saying that, are they? And you were going to say--what?"
+
+"Simply this: the negro's the guilty man. The facts speak for themselves,
+and facts are incontrovertible. As surely as the sun shines, Carpenter
+killed your daughter. Why, then, continue this gossip, slander which
+besmirches Withers and is bound to attack your daughter's name?"
+
+"What do you mean? Be a little more specific, please."
+
+"I mean: what do you and Withers gain by letting Braceway keep this thing
+before the public?"
+
+Fulton leaned far forward in his chair, his lower lip thrust out, his
+eyes blazing.
+
+"No, sir!" he exploded. "I'll never call Braceway off! They're gossiping,
+are they? They can gossip until they're blue in the face. What do I
+care for public opinion, for gossip, for their leers and whispers?
+Nothing--not a snap of the finger! To hell with what they say! What
+I want is vengeance. I'll have it! Call Braceway off? Not while there's
+breath in me!"
+
+He paused and bit on his lip.
+
+"Understand me, Mr. Bristow," he continued, his tone more moderate. "I
+meant no criticism of you; I know how faithfully you've worked. I realize
+even that you have proved your case. But I can't accept it, that's all.
+You'll forgive an old man's temper."
+
+Bristow carried the argument no further. He saw that Fulton, and Withers
+too, would follow Braceway's lead. Consequently, he was confronted with
+the necessity of keeping up the idiotic duel with the Atlanta detective.
+
+Moreover, he sensed the viewpoint of the dead woman's family. They were
+averse to believing she had been the victim of an ordinary negro burglar.
+Remembering her beauty and charm, her cleverness and lovable qualities,
+they preferred to think that some one under great emotion, or with a
+terrific gift for crime, had cut short her brilliant existence.
+
+People, he meditated, find foolish and bizarre means of comforting
+themselves when overwhelmed by great tragedy. Very well, then; let it go
+at that. After all, it was not his funeral.
+
+Accompanying Fulton to the sidewalk, he climbed into the automobile and,
+in a few minutes, was in the library asking for the first volume of the
+last edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His limp proclaimed his
+identity, and the young woman at the desk, recognizing him, got the book
+for him with surprising promptness.
+
+His habits of thought were such that he had not wasted energy during
+the morning in idle speculation as to what he would find. In fact, he
+attached but little importance to Braceway's message. He had dismissed it
+the night before as a queer dodge on the other's part to bolster up his
+view of the case.
+
+He went to a desk in a remote part of the reading room. Under any
+circumstances, he would not have cared for the intense and interested
+scrutiny with which the girl at the desk favoured him. The attitude he
+took gave her ample opportunity for a study of the back of his head.
+
+Opening the volume, he turned to the first reference, page 506, column 2,
+line 15 to line 17. At the first word he drew a quick breath; it was
+sharp enough to sound like a low whistle. He read:
+
+"ALBINO, a biological term (Lat. _albus_, white), in the usual
+acceptation, for a pigmentless individual of a normally pigmented race."
+
+Putting his finger on the top of the second column, page 507, he counted
+down to line 17, and read:
+
+"Albinism occurs in all races of mankind, among mountainous as well as
+lowland dwellers. And, with man, as with other animals, it may be
+complete or partial. Instances of the latter condition are very common
+among the negroes of the United States and of South America, and in them
+assumes a piebald character, irregular white patches being scattered over
+the general black surface of the body."
+
+Before he began to think, he read the passages carefully a second time.
+Then he continued to hold the book open, staring at it as if he still
+read.
+
+The importance of the words struck him immediately. He grasped their
+meaning as quickly and as fully as he would have done if Braceway had
+stood beside him and explained. The skin of a white person and that of an
+albino show up the same under a microscope: white. If a man had under his
+finger nails particles of white skin, he could have collected them there
+by scratching an albino as well as by scratching a Caucasian, a white
+woman.
+
+And Lucy Thomas was an albino. He was certain of that; did not question
+it for a moment. Braceway had assured himself of that before sending
+the telegram.
+
+Perry Carpenter had had a fight or a tussle with her in securing the key
+to No. 5 the night of the murder, and in the scoffling he had scratched
+her. That, at least, would be Perry's story and Lucy's. Braceway had been
+certain of that also before wiring to him.
+
+As a matter of fact, Braceway had known all this before they had started
+for Washington and had kept it back, playing with him, laughing up his
+sleeve. The thought nettled him, finally made him thoroughly angry. He
+compelled himself to weigh the new situation carefully.
+
+Well, what of it, even if Lucy were an albino and Perry had scratched
+her? Did that affect materially the case against Perry? There was still
+evidence to prove that he had been to the Withers' bungalow. He had
+confessed it himself. And the lavalliere incidents and the blouse buttons
+substantiated it still further.
+
+The albino argument was by no means final, could not be made definite.
+The fact remained that there had been scratches on the murdered woman's
+hand and that particles of a white person's skin had been found under
+Perry's finger nails. That was not to be denied. Of course, the negro's
+attorney could argue that these particles had come from Lucy Thomas, not
+from Mrs. Withers.
+
+But it would be only an argument. The jury would pass judgment on it--and
+he was willing to leave it to the jury.
+
+He closed the book, took it back to the desk and thanked the young woman.
+There was nothing in his appearance to indicate disappointment. In fact,
+he felt none. By the time he reached home he had gone over the whole
+thing once more and dismissed it as of no real consequence. Braceway's
+discovery, or his making the discovery known, had come too late.
+
+If it had been brought out ahead of Perry's confession--yes; it would
+have made quite a difference then.
+
+"Let the heathen rage!" he thought, remembering the bitter stubbornness
+with which Braceway and Fulton denied the negro's guilt.
+
+Braceway's withholding the albino information, playing him for a fool,
+recurred to him, and the accustomed flush on his cheeks grew deeper. He
+would not forget that; he would pay it back--with interest.
+
+He turned to the Loutois case. Going to his typewriter, he made a list of
+New Orleans, Atlanta, and New York newspapers.
+
+"Mattie," he called, "_I_ want you to go down to a news-stand, the big
+one; I think it's at the corner of Haywood and Patton."
+
+He handed her money.
+
+"And here's a list of the papers you're to get. Ask for all of them
+published since last Friday. Be as quick as you can. I'm in a hurry."
+
+When she came back, she brought also the early edition of the Furmville
+afternoon paper. He glanced at it, looking for Washington or Baltimore
+news of Braceway's activities. He found it on the front page. The
+headlines read:
+
+     FINDS NEW EVIDENCE
+     ON WITHERS MURDER
+
+     MORLEY GUILTY, OR--WHO?
+
+     Whereabouts of Murdered Woman's Husband
+     Not Known--Braceway Predicts New
+     and Amazing Disclosure.
+
+The dispatch itself was:
+
+  "Washington, D. C., May 14.--That an entirely new light will soon be
+   thrown on the brutal murder of Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers, beauty and
+   society favourite of Atlanta and Washington, became known here today.
+
+  "Samuel S. Braceway, probably the ablest private detective in this
+   country, left this city yesterday afternoon for Furmville, N. C., the
+   scene of the crime, after he had completed an exhaustive investigation
+   here and in Baltimore of more or less obscure matters related to the
+   murder. Police officials here state that the negro, Perry Carpenter,
+   now held in the Furmville jail for the crime, will never go to trial.
+
+  "This, they claim, will be but one result of the work Braceway did here
+   and in Baltimore. The detective himself was reticent when interviewed
+   just before he caught his train, but, as he stood on the platform,
+   nobbily dressed and twirling his walking stick, he was the picture of
+   confidence.
+
+  "'I think you're safe in saying,' he admitted 'that the Withers case
+   hasn't yet been settled. We're due for some surprising disclosures
+   unless I miss my guess.'
+
+  "'Can you tell us anything about the suspicions directed against Henry
+   Morley?' he was asked.
+
+  "'It's Morley or--somebody else,' Braceway said smilingly. 'Anybody can
+   study the facts and satisfy himself on that point.'
+
+  "'Who's the somebody else?'
+
+  "'We'll know pretty soon. In fact, things should develop in less than a
+   week, considerably less than a week.'
+
+  "One of the interesting sidelights on this mysterious murder case, it
+   was learned this morning, is that the whereabouts of the murdered
+   woman's husband, George S. Withers of Atlanta, is at present unknown.
+   Dispatches from Atlanta say he disappeared from there the morning his
+   wife's funeral took place. Advices from Furmville are that he is not
+   there with his father-in-law and sister-in-law. Braceway said
+   yesterday he knew nothing of Withers' whereabouts."
+
+Beneath the Washington dispatch was one from Atlanta:
+
+  "Inquiry made here today failed to disclose where George S. Withers,
+   husband of the victim of the brutal crime at Furmville, N. C., is now.
+   He left this city the morning Mrs. Withers was buried, according to
+   his friends, but said nothing as to his destination or the probable
+   length of time he would be away.
+
+  "The Atlanta authorities were asked by the Washington police to locate
+   him if possible. No reason for the request was given."
+
+There was a smile on Bristow's lips when he tossed the paper to one side.
+Braceway, he deduced from the article, was having his troubles making the
+Morley theory hang together. And why should he hurry back to Furmville?
+There was nothing new here.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders and unwrapped the bundle of out-of-town papers.
+
+Recalling how late he had received the albino message the night before,
+he concluded that Braceway had filed it in Washington during the
+afternoon, with instructions that it be sent as a night message. His
+resentment for Braceway flared up again.
+
+"'Amazing disclosure,'" he mentally quoted the headlines. "Well, we shall
+see what we shall see. Perhaps, it will come as an amazing disclosure to
+him that I've been on the sound side of this question all along."
+
+He began the work of cutting from the papers the accounts of the Loutois
+kidnapping. As he read them, he built up a tentative outline showing
+who the kidnappers were and where they probably had secreted the boy. He
+grew absorbed, whistling in a low key.
+
+So far as he was concerned, the Withers case was a closed incident.
+
+Early in the afternoon he called Greenleaf on the telephone, and
+announced:
+
+"I'm leaving town for a few days tomorrow morning."
+
+"Again! What for?" the chief asked.
+
+"They've asked me to work out that kidnapping case in New Orleans--the
+Loutois child."
+
+"Good! I'm glad to hear it; I congratulate you."
+
+Greenleaf was sincerely pleased. He felt that he had sponsored and
+developed the lame man as a detective.
+
+"Thanks. Before I go, I want to have a talk with you. We might as well go
+over everything once more and----"
+
+"That reminds me. I was just about to call you up, but your news made me
+forget. I've a wire from Braceway, just got it. He filed it at Salisbury,
+on his way here. Let me read it to you:
+
+  "'Have all the stuff I can get on Withers case. Can not go further
+   before conferring with you, Bristow, Fulton, and Abrahamson. Please
+   arrange meeting of all these Bristow's bungalow eight tonight. Withers
+   not with me.'"
+
+"That fits in," Bristow commented; "lets me start for New Orleans on the
+late night train."
+
+"Wonder what he's got," the chief questioned. "Do you know?"
+
+"No. And I don't believe it amounts to anything. Still, if he wants to
+talk, we might as well hear it."
+
+"Sure! You can count on me. I'll be there."
+
+"All right," said Bristow. "I'll see you at eight, then."
+
+He went to the sleeping porch and lay down.
+
+"'Withers not with me,'" the last words of the telegram lingered in his
+mind. "Why did he add that? What's that to do with a conference here
+tonight?"
+
+Suddenly the answer occurred to him.
+
+"It's Withers!" he thought, at first only half-credulous. "He's going to
+put it on Withers; he's going to try to put it on Withers."
+
+He paused, thinking "wild" for a moment, so great was his surprise.
+
+"It was Withers he was after from the start,--was it?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+THE REVELATION
+
+
+Braceway and Maria Fulton had upon their faces that expression which
+announces a happy understanding between lovers. The light of surrender
+was in her eyes, contented surrender to the man who, because of his love,
+had asserted his mastery of her. And his voice, as he spoke to her, was
+all a vibrant tenderness. He realized that he had found and finally made
+certain his happiness, had done so at the very moment of making public
+his greatest professional triumph.
+
+For his visit to her he had stolen a half-hour from the rush of work that
+had devolved upon him since reaching Furmville a few hours ago. He found
+her as he had expected; she fulfilled his prophecy that, in following her
+own ideals, she would take her place in the world as a fascinating
+personality, a lovable woman.
+
+But, while he studied and praised her new charm, he was conscious, more
+keenly so than ever before, that his success would affect her greatly,
+would challenge all her strength and courage. And yet, even if it hurt
+her, it had to be done. It was his duty, and the consequences would have
+to take care of themselves.
+
+Although, in her turn, she regarded him with the fine intuition of the
+woman who loves, she got no intimation of his worry. He had determined
+not to burden her with the details in advance. If what he was about to do
+should link her dead sister with a pitiless scandal, she would meet it
+bravely.
+
+Unless he had been confident of that, he could not have loved her. His
+task was to hand over to justice the guilty man, and not even his concern
+for the woman he would marry could interfere with his seeing the thing
+through.
+
+After it was all over, he would come back to comfort her. Their new
+happiness would counter-balance all. So he thought, with confidence.
+
+A glance through the window showed him Greenleaf and Abrahamson coming
+slowly up Manniston Road. It was eight o'clock. A few moments later he
+and Mr. Fulton joined them on the sidewalk. They went at once to No. 9.
+
+Bristow received them in his living room, the table still littered with
+newspaper clippings on the Loutois kidnapping.
+
+"If the rest of you don't mind," Braceway suggested, "we'd better close
+the windows. We've a lot of talking to do, and we might as well keep
+things to ourselves."
+
+The effect of alertness which he always produced was more evident now
+than ever. He kept his cane and himself in continual motion. While the
+four other men seated themselves, he remained standing, facing them, his
+back to the empty fire-place.
+
+"Each of you," he said, "is vitally interested in what I've come here to
+say. I asked you to have this conference because it affects each of us
+directly."
+
+His eyes shone, his chin was thrust forward, every ligament in his body
+was strung taut. And yet, there was nothing of the theatric about him.
+If he felt excitement, it was suppressed. Determination was the only
+emotion of which he gave any sign.
+
+"First, however," he supplemented in his light, conversational tone, "how
+about you?" He indicated with a look Greenleaf and Bristow. "Have you
+anything new, anything additional?"
+
+With the windows shut, it was noticeably warm and close in the room.
+Taking off his coat, he tossed it to the chair which had been placed for
+him. In his white shirt, with dark trousers belted tightly over slender
+hips, he looked almost boyish.
+
+"No," Bristow answered. "The chief and I went over everything yesterday.
+We couldn't find a single reason for changing our minds."
+
+"About Carpenter?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You mean that's your position, yours and the chiefs," Braceway said
+seriously. "As a matter of fact, the negro's not guilty."
+
+"You mean that's your position," Bristow quoted back to him, his smile
+indulgent.
+
+"Yes. Carpenter's not guilty, and Morley's not guilty."
+
+Mr. Fulton, who had the chair immediately on the lame man's left, was
+frankly curious and anxious.
+
+"Before you go any further, Braceway," he interrupted testily, "can you
+tell us where George Withers is?"
+
+"I can say this much," replied Braceway after a pause: "for reasons best
+known to himself, Withers refused to join us here. He could have done so
+if he had wished."
+
+What he said sounded like a direct accusation of Withers. Fulton eyed him
+incredulously. Bristow took off his coat and settled himself more
+comfortably in his chair; he was in for a long story, he thought, and, as
+he had expected last night, the dead woman's husband, not Morley, was to
+be incriminated.
+
+Greenleaf, lolling back in a rocker near the folding doors of the dining
+room, gazed at the ceiling, making a show of lack of interest.
+
+Abrahamson, nearest the porch door, was the only auditor thoroughly
+absorbed in the detective's story and at the same time unreservedly
+credulous.
+
+"But you know where he is?" Fulton persisted.
+
+"Yes; approximately."
+
+The Jew's sparkling eyes darted from the speaker to the faces of the
+others. A pleased smile lifted the corners of his mouth toward the great,
+hooked nose. He anticipated unusually pleasant entertainment.
+
+"But I don't want to waste your time," Braceway continued, taking
+peculiar care in his choice of words. "When I began work on this case,
+I thought either the negro or Morley might be the murderer. I changed
+my mind when I came to think about the mysterious fellow, the man with
+the brown beard and the gold tooth, the individual who was clever enough
+to appear and disappear at will, to vanish without leaving a trace so
+long as he operated at night or in the dusk of early evening.
+
+"I agreed with Mr. Fulton that he was the murderer. Not only that, but he
+had remarkable ability which he employed for the lowest and most criminal
+purposes. I first suspected his identity right after my interviews last
+Wednesday with Roddy, the coloured bellboy, and Mr. Abrahamson, the pawn
+broker."
+
+"Excuse me," Bristow interposed; "but wasn't it Abrahamson who told you
+the bearded man looked like Withers?"
+
+Greenleaf grinned, appreciating the lame man's intention to take the wind
+out of Braceway's sails by giving credit to Abrahamson for the
+information.
+
+"Yes, he told me that," Braceway answered, as if nettled by the
+interruption; and added: "Let me finish my statement, Bristow. You can
+discuss it all you please later on. But I'd prefer to get through with it
+now.
+
+"Having suspected the identity of the disguised man, I was confronted
+with two jobs. One was to prove the identity beyond question; the other
+was to show, by irrefutable evidence, that the disguised man committed
+the murder. As I said, my theory took shape in my mind that afternoon in
+my room in the Brevord Hotel. Everything I've done since then, has been
+for the purpose of getting the necessary facts.
+
+"I have those facts now."
+
+He looked at Greenleaf and Bristow, making it plain that he expected
+their hostility to anything he had to say.
+
+"My suspicion grew out of my belief that I must find the man who had
+blackmailed Mrs. Withers in Atlantic City and Washington, and, for the
+third time, here in Furmville. The blackmailer was the only one who had
+had access to the victim on the three different occasions of which we
+know; the work was all by the same hand. Find the blackmailer, and I had
+the murderer.
+
+"I know now who he is.
+
+"Five years ago there was a striking sort of individuality that had
+impressed itself on the minds of a good many men in Wall Street, New York
+City. Although penniless at the outset of his career, and in fact never
+really rich, he had made a good deal of money now and then; and had spent
+it as fast as he got it.
+
+"He was brilliant, thoroughly unscrupulous, absolutely without honour. He
+did the 'Great White Way' stunt--the restaurants, the roof gardens, a
+pretty actress at times, jewels and champagne. Because of his uncertain
+habits, he never had an office of his own. He always operated through
+others. His earning power was a gift of judging the market and knowing
+when to 'bear' and when to 'bull.'
+
+"This gift was no fabulous thing. It was real in a majority of the times
+he tried to use it, and because of it he was able to live high and put up
+a good front. This was the situation up to five years ago. Observe the
+man's character and the pleasure he took in running crooked.
+
+"With a little study and the usual amount of industry and concentration,
+he could have been a power in the financial world. That, however, did
+not appeal to him. He liked the excitement of crime, the perverted
+pleasure of playing the crook.
+
+"Early in nineteen-thirteen, a little more than five years ago, the crash
+came. He was arrested, charged with the embezzlement of thirty-three
+hundred dollars from the firm which employed him. The name of the firm
+was Blanchard and Sebastian. He had stolen more than the amount
+mentioned, but the specific charge on which action was taken was the
+theft of the thirty-three hundred.
+
+"This man's name was Splain.
+
+"There was a delay of a few hours in arranging for his bail so that he
+wouldn't have to spend the night in prison. While in his cell, he
+remarked:
+
+"'This kind of a place doesn't suit me. It's as cold as charity. I'll be
+out of here in an hour or so, and, if they ever get me into a cell again,
+they'll have to kill me first. Once is enough.'
+
+"He made good his boast. They didn't get him into one again. He jumped
+his bail ten days before the date set for his trial. Since then the
+police have, so far as they know, never laid eyes on him. They had a
+photograph of him, of course, an adequate description: high aquiline
+nose; firm, compressed mouth; black and unusually piercing eyes; black
+hair; all his features sharp-cut; broad shoulders, and slender, athletic
+figure. Those are some of the details I recall. In----"
+
+Fulton cried out. It was like the shrill, indefinite protest of a child
+against pain. He put the fingers of his right hand to his forehead,
+shielding his face. The description of the fugitive had brought instantly
+to his mind the face of George Withers.
+
+"Indulge me for just a few moments more, Mr. Fulton," Braceway said.
+"Splain eluded the pursuit. His flight and disappearance were perfectly
+planned and carried out, and----"
+
+Bristow again interrupted the recital. On his face was a smile which did
+not reach to his eyes. For the past few minutes he had been thinking
+faster than he had ever thought in his life, and had made a decision.
+
+"What you've told us," he said calmly, his gaze taking knowledge of no
+one but the detective, "is, in effect, a rather flattering sketch of a
+part of my own life."
+
+Greenleaf, with jaw dropped and thinking powers paralyzed, stared at him.
+Fulton leaned forward as if to spring.
+
+Only Abrahamson, his smile broadening, his cavernous eyes alight, was
+free from surprise. He had now the air of greatly enjoying the
+performance he had been invited to see.
+
+Braceway, his shoulders flung back, his figure straight as a poplar,
+watching Bristow with intense caution, grew suddenly into heroic mould.
+The red glow from the setting sun streamed through the window to his
+face, emphasizing the ardour in his eyes. He took a step forward, became
+dominant, menacing.
+
+His white-clad arm shot out so that he pointed with accusing finger to
+the imperturbable Bristow.
+
+"That man there," he declared, a crawling contempt in his voice, "is the
+thief and the murderer!"
+
+For a heavy moment the incredible accusation stunned the entire group.
+
+"Mr. Braceway," said Bristow, looking now at Fulton and Greenleaf, "is
+suffering a delusion."
+
+The two men, however, afforded him no support. They kept their eyes on
+Braceway. They gave the effect of falling away from some evil contagion.
+
+"Because," Bristow continued, "I have been the innocent victim of trumped
+up charges of embezzlement by the crookedest man in a crooked business,
+he accuses me of murder when----"
+
+"Shut up!" commanded Braceway, dropping his hand to his side.
+
+He flashed the pawn broker a quick glance.
+
+Abrahamson leaned over and rapped with his knuckles on the door to the
+porch. It opened, admitting two policemen in uniform.
+
+"I took the liberty, chief," Braceway apologized, "of requesting them to
+be here. I knew you'd want them to do the right thing, and promptly."
+
+Greenleaf gulped, nodded acquiescence. Stunned as he was, the detective's
+manner forced him into believing the charge.
+
+Bristow's smile had faded. But, save for a pallor that wiped from his
+checks their usual flush, there was no evidence of the conflict within
+him. So far as any notice from him went, the policemen did not exist.
+
+One of them stepped forward and laid a hand on his shoulder.
+
+He ignored it
+
+"Perhaps," he said, sarcasm in his voice, his eyes again on Braceway,
+"it will occur to you that I've a right to know why this outrage is
+committed."
+
+Once more he commanded Greenleaf with his eyes.
+
+"The chief of police will hardly sanction it without some excuse, without
+a shadow of evidence."
+
+"Yes," Greenleaf complied waveringly. "Er--, that is--er--I suppose
+you're certain about this, Mr. Braceway?"
+
+"Let's have it! Let's have it all!" demanded Fulton, articulate at last,
+his clenched hands shaken by the palsy of rage.
+
+Bristow, with a careless motion, brushed away the policeman's hand.
+
+"By all means," he said, imperturbable still; "I demand it. I'm not
+guilty of murder. Not by the wildest flight of the craziest fancy can any
+such charge be substantiated."
+
+Greenleaf, noting his iron nerve, his freedom from the slightest sign of
+panic, was dumbfounded, and believed in his innocence again.
+
+"I have the proofs," Braceway said to the chief. "Do you want them here,
+and now?"
+
+"It might be--er--as well, and--and fair, you know. Yes."
+
+Abrahamson swung the porch door shut. The two policemen stood back of
+Bristow's chair. Greenleaf, still bewildered, laid a calming hand on
+Fulton's shoulder. The old man was shaking like a leaf.
+
+"All right," agreed Braceway. "I can give you the important points in a
+very few minutes; the high lights."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+CONFESSION VOLUNTARY
+
+
+Braceway leaned against the mantel, relaxed, swinging his cane slowly in
+his right hand, a careless, easy grace in his attitude. He addressed
+himself to Fulton and Greenleaf, an occasional glance including
+Abrahamson in the circle of those for whose benefit he spoke.
+
+Bristow listened now in unfeigned absorption, estimating every statement,
+weighing each detail. The tenseness of his pale face showed how he forced
+his brain to concentration.
+
+"Having decided that the bearded man and the murderer were the same,"
+Braceway began, "I asked myself this question: 'Who, of all those in
+Furmville, is so connected with the case now that I am warranted in
+thinking he did the previous blackmailing and this murder?' And I
+eliminated in my own mind everybody but Lawrence Bristow. He was the one,
+the only one, who could have annoyed Mrs. Withers one and four years ago,
+respectively, and also could have murdered her.
+
+"Morley was at once out of the reckoning; he had known the Fultons for
+only the past three years. To consider the negro, Perry Carpenter, would
+have been absurd. Withers, of course, was beyond suspicion. Everything
+pointed to Bristow.
+
+"With that decision last Wednesday afternoon, I went to Number Five and
+got all the finger-prints visible on the polished surfaces of the chair
+which was handled, overturned, in the living room the night of the
+murder. Fortunately, this polish was inferior enough to have been made
+gummy by the rain and dampness that night; and, in the stress of the few
+days following, had been neither dusted nor wiped off.
+
+"Bristow did not touch this chair the morning the murder was discovered.
+In fact, he cautioned everybody not to touch it.
+
+"Reliable witnesses say he didn't touch it between then and the time I
+got the finger-prints. He declares he was never in the bungalow before he
+entered it in response to Miss Fulton's cry for help.
+
+"I found on the chair the finger-prints of five different persons, four
+afterwards identified: Miss Fulton, the coroner, Miss Kelly and Lucy
+Thomas. The fifth I was unable to check up then.
+
+"I did so later, in Washington.
+
+"It was identical with the print of Bristow's fingers on the glass top of
+a table in his hotel room there. I didn't depend on my own judgment for
+that. I had with me an expert on finger-prints. And finger-prints, as you
+all know, never lie.
+
+"All this established the fact, beyond question, that Bristow had been
+secretly in the living room of Number Five before, or at the time of, the
+commission of the crime."
+
+He paused, giving them time to appreciate the full import of that chain
+of facts.
+
+For the space of half a minute, the room was a study in still life. The
+sound of Fulton's grating teeth was distinctly audible. Bristow made a
+quick move, as if to speak, but checked the impulse.
+
+"In Washington," Braceway resumed, "he had the hemorrhage. It was
+faked--a red-ink hemorrhage. Before the arrival of the physician who was
+summoned, Bristow had ordered a bellboy to wrap the 'blood-stained'
+handkerchief and towel in a larger and thicker towel and to have the
+whole bundle burned at once.
+
+"This, he explained to the boy, was because of his desire that nobody be
+put in danger of contracting tuberculosis.
+
+"By bribing the porter who had been directed to do the burning, I got a
+look at both the handkerchief and the towel. They were soaked right
+enough, thoroughly soaked--in the red ink.
+
+"The physician was easily deceived because, when he came in, all traces
+of the so-called blood had been obliterated. Altogether, it was a clever
+trick on Bristow's part.
+
+"His motive for staging it and for arranging for a long and uninterrupted
+sleep was clear enough. There was something he wanted to do unobserved,
+something so vital to him that he was willing to take an immense amount
+of trouble with it. Golson's detective bureau let me have the best
+trailer, the smoothest 'shadow,' in the business--Tom Ricketts.
+
+"At my direction he followed Bristow from the Willard Hotel to the
+electric car leaving Washington for Baltimore at one o'clock. Reaching
+Baltimore at two-thirty, Bristow pawned the emeralds and diamonds at two
+pawnshops. He caught the four o'clock electric car back to Washington,
+and was in his room long before six, the hour at which his nurse, Miss
+Martin, was to wake him.
+
+"On the Baltimore trip he had a left leg as sound as mine and wore no
+brace of any kind. He did wear a moustache, and bushy eyebrows, which
+changed his appearance tremendously. Also, he had changed the outline of
+his face and the shape of his lips.
+
+"While he was in Baltimore, I searched the bedroom in which he was
+supposed to be asleep.
+
+"Miss Martin, in whom I had been obliged to confide, helped me. We found
+in the two-inch sole of the left shoe, which of course he did not take
+with him, a hollow place, a very serviceable receptacle. In it was the
+bulk of the missing Withers jewelry, the stones unset, pried from their
+gold and platinum settings.
+
+"They are, I dare say, there now."
+
+The two policemen stared wide-eyed at Bristow. He was, they decided, the
+"slickest" man they had ever seen.
+
+"You see why he executed the trick? It was to establish forever, beyond
+the possibility of question, his innocence. Plainly, if an unknown man
+pawned the Withers jewelry in Baltimore while Bristow slept, exhausted by
+a major hemorrhage, in Washington, his case was made good, his alibi
+perfect.
+
+"You can appreciate now how he built up his fake case against Perry
+Carpenter, his use of the buttons, his creeping about at night, like a
+villain in cheap melodrama, dropping pieces of the jewelry where they
+would incriminate the negro most surely, and his exploitation of the
+'winning clue,' the finger nail evidence.
+
+"Furthermore, he gave Lucy Thomas a frightful beating to force from her
+the statement against Perry. In this, he was brutal beyond belief. I saw
+that same afternoon the marks of his blows on her shoulders. They were
+sufficient proofs of his capacity for unbridled rage. The sight of them
+strengthened my conviction that, in a similar mood, he had murdered Mrs.
+Withers."
+
+"The negro lied!" Bristow broke in at last, his words a little fast
+despite his surface equanimity. "I subjected her to no ill treatment
+whatever. Anyway"--he dismissed it with a wave of his hand--"it's a minor
+detail."
+
+Braceway, without so much as a glance at him, continued:
+
+"And that gave me my knowledge of her being a partial albino. She has
+patches of white skin across her shoulders, and Perry, in struggling with
+her for possession of the key to Number Five, had scratched her there
+badly. That, I think, disposes of the finger nail evidence against
+Carpenter.
+
+"The rest followed as a matter of course. An examination of Major Ross'
+collection of circulars describing those 'wanted' by the police of the
+various cities for the past six years revealed the photograph of Splain.
+Bristow has changed his appearance somewhat--enough, perhaps, to deceive
+the casual glance--but the identification was easy.
+
+"I then ran over to New York and got the Splain story. I knew he was so
+dead sure of having eluded everybody that he would stay here in
+Furmville. But, to make it absolutely sure, I sent him yesterday a
+telegram to keep him assured that I was working with him and ready to
+share discoveries with him. And I confess it afforded me a little
+pleasure, the sending of that wire. I was playing a kind of cat-and-mouse
+game."
+
+Bristow put up his hand, demanding attention. When Braceway ignored the
+gesture, he leaned back, smiling, derisive.
+
+"Morley's embezzlement and its consequences gave me a happy excuse for
+keeping on this fellow's trail while he was busy perfecting the machinery
+for Perry's destruction. The man's self-assurance, his conceit----"
+
+"I've had enough of this!" Bristow cut in violently, exhibiting his first
+deep emotion. He turned to Greenleaf:
+
+"Haven't you had enough of this drool? What's the man trying to establish
+anyhow? He talks in one breath about my having changed the outline of my
+face and the shape of my mouth, and in the next second about recognizing
+as me a photograph which he admits was taken at least six years ago!
+
+"It's an alibi for himself, an excuse for not being able to prove that
+I'm the man who pawned the jewelry in Baltimore! It's thinner than air!"
+
+But Greenleaf's defection was now complete.
+
+"Go on," he said to Braceway. The more he thought of the full extent to
+which the embezzler had gulled him for the past week, the more he raged.
+
+"Not for me! I don't want any more of the drivel!" Bristow objected
+again, his voice raucous and still directed to Greenleaf. "What's _your_
+idea? I admit I'm wanted in New York on a trumped-up charge of
+embezzlement. This detective, by a stroke of blind luck, ran into that;
+and, as I say, I admit it.
+
+"You can deal with that as you see fit; that is, if you want to deal with
+it after what I've done for law and order, and for you, in this murder
+case.
+
+"But you can't be crazy enough to take any stock in this nonsense about
+my having been connected with the crime. Exercise your own intelligence!
+Great God, man! Do you mean to say you're going to let him cram this into
+you?"
+
+He got himself more in hand.
+
+"Think a minute. You know me well, chief. And you, Mr. Fulton, you're no
+child to be bamboozled and turned into a laughing stock by a detective
+who finds himself without a case--a pseudo expert on crime who tries to
+work the age-old trick of railroading a man guilty of a less offense!"
+
+"This is no place for an argument of the case," Braceway said crisply.
+"Mr. Abrahamson, tell us what you know about this man."
+
+"It is not much, Mr. Braceway," the Jew replied; "not as much as I would
+like. I've seen him several times; once in my place when he was fixed up
+with moustache and so forth, and twice when he was fixed up with a beard
+and a gold tooth; once again when he was sitting out here on his porch."
+
+Abrahamson talked rapidly, punctuating his phrases with quick gestures,
+enjoying the importance of his role.
+
+"Mr. Braceway," he explained smilingly to Greenleaf, "talked to me about
+the man with the beard--talked more than you did, chief. You know Mr.
+Braceway--how quick he is. He talked and asked me to try to remember
+where and when I had seen this Mr. Bristow. I had my ideas and my
+association of ideas. I remembered--remembered hard. That afternoon I
+took a holiday--I don't take many of those--and I walked past here.
+'I bet you,' I said to myself--not out real loud, you understand--'I bet
+you I know that man.' And I won my bet. I did know him.
+
+"This Mr. Splain and the man with the beard are the same, exactly the
+same."
+
+Bristow's smile was tolerant, as if he dealt with a child. But Fulton,
+his angry eyes boring into the accused man, saw that, for the first time,
+there were tired lines tugging the corners of his mouth. It was an
+expression that heralded defeat, the first faint shadow of despair.
+
+"You have my story, and I've the facts to prove it a hundred times over,"
+Braceway announced. "Why waste more time?"
+
+"For the simple reason," Bristow fought on, "that I'm entitled to a fair
+deal, an honest----"
+
+On the word "honest" Braceway turned with his electric quickness to
+Greenleaf, and, as he did so, Bristow leaned back in his chair, as if
+determined not to argue further. His face assumed its hard, bleak calm;
+his cold self-control returned.
+
+"Now, get this!" Braceway's incisive tone whipped Greenleaf to closer
+attention. "You've an embezzler and murderer in your hands. He admits one
+crime; I've proved the other. The rest is up to you. Put the irons on
+him. Throw him into a cell! You'll be proud of it the rest of your life.
+Here's the warrant."
+
+He drew the paper from his hip pocket and tossed it to the chief.
+
+"Get busy," he insisted. "This man's the worst type of criminal I've ever
+encountered. Not content with blackmailing and robbing a woman, he
+murdered her; not satisfied with that, he deliberately planned the death
+of an innocent man because he, in his cowardice, was afraid to take the
+ordinary chances of escaping detection. By openly parading his pursuit of
+breakers of the law, he secured secretly his opportunity to excel their
+basest actions. He----"
+
+Quicker than thought, Braceway lunged forward with his cane and struck
+the hand Bristow had lifted swiftly to his throat. The blow sent a pocket
+knife clattering to the floor. A policeman, picking it up, saw that the
+opened blade worked on a spring.
+
+The accused man sank back in his chair. The gray immobility of his face
+had broken up. The features worked curiously, forming themselves for a
+second to a pattern of mean vindictiveness. His right hand still numbed
+by the blow, he took his handkerchief with the left and flicked from his
+neck, close to the ear, a single red bead.
+
+"Search him," Braceway ordered one of the officers.
+
+Bristow submitted to that. When he looked at Braceway, his face was still
+bleak.
+
+"You've got me," he said in a tone thoroughly matter-of-fact. "I'm
+through. I'll give you a statement."
+
+"You mean a confession?"
+
+"It amounts to that."
+
+"Not here," Braceway refused curtly. "We've no stenographer."
+
+"I'd prefer to write it myself anyway," he insisted. "It won't take me
+fifteen minutes on the typewriter." Seeing Braceway hesitate, he added:
+"You'll get it this way, or not at all. Suit yourself."
+
+The detective did not underestimate the man's stubborn nerve.
+
+"I'm agreeable, chief," he said to Greenleaf, "if you are."
+
+"Yes," the chief agreed. "It's as good here as anywhere else."
+
+Darkness had grown in the room. Abrahamson and the policeman pulled down
+the window shades. Greenleaf turned on the lights.
+
+Bristow limped to the typewriter and sat down. Braceway opened the drawer
+of the typewriter stand and saw that it contained nothing but sheets of
+yellow "copy" paper cut to one-half the size of ordinary letter paper.
+
+Every trace of agitation had left Bristow. Colour crept back into his
+cheeks.
+
+Braceway and Greenleaf watched him closely. They had the idea that he
+still contemplated suicide, that he sought to divert their attention from
+himself by interesting them in what he wrote. They remembered the boast
+he had made in the cell in New York.
+
+He felt their wariness, and smiled.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE LAST CARD
+
+
+He worked with surprising rapidity, tearing from the machine and passing
+to Braceway each half-page as he finished it. He wrote triple-space,
+breaking the story into many paragraphs, never hesitating for a choice of
+words.
+
+  "My name is Thomas F. Splain.
+
+  "I am forty years old.
+
+  "I am 'wanted' in New York for embezzlement.
+
+  "Fear is an unknown quantity to me. I have always had ample
+   self-confidence. The world belongs to the impudent.
+
+  "I learned long ago that no man is at heart either grateful, or honest,
+   or unselfish."
+
+With a turn of the roller, he flicked that off the machine and, without
+raising his head, passed it to Braceway. The detective glanced at it long
+enough to get its meaning and handed it to Fulton. When it was offered to
+Greenleaf, he shook his head.
+
+The chiefs rage had reached its high point. To his realization of how
+perfectly he had been duped, there was added the humiliation of having
+two members of his force as witnesses of its revelation.
+
+"If he makes a move," he thought savagely, fingering the revolver in the
+side pocket of his coat, "I'll kill him certain."
+
+The man at the machine wrote on:
+
+  "After leaving New York, I was caught in a street accident in Chicago,
+   suffering a broken nose. Thanks to my physicians--an incompetent lot,
+   these doctors--I emerged with a crooked nose.
+
+  "That was a help. I then had all my teeth extracted. Knowing dentistry,
+   I saw the possibilities of disguise by wearing differently shaped sets
+   of teeth.
+
+  "Note my heavily protruding lower lip--and, at rare intervals, my
+   hollow cheeks.
+
+  "Also, there's your gold-tooth mystery--solved!
+
+  "As a disguise, the gold tooth is admirable. I mean a solid, complete
+   tooth of gold, garish in the front part of the mouth.
+
+  "It unfailingly changes the expression; frequently, it degrades and
+   brutalizes the face. Try it.
+
+  "Using my crooked nose as an every-day precaution, I always
+   straightened it for night work. Forestier taught me that--great man,
+   Forestier; marvellous with noses.
+
+  "He is now piling up a fortune as make-up specialist for motion
+   pictures in Los Angeles--has a secret preparation with which he
+   'builds' new noses.
+
+  "Changing the colour of my eyes was something beyond the police
+   imagination.
+
+  "I got the trick from a man in Cincinnati--another great character.
+   Homatropine is the basic element of his preparation.
+
+  "Some day women will hear of it and make him rich. He deserves it."
+
+Fulton, after he had read that, looked at Braceway out of tortured eyes.
+This turning of his tragedy into jest defied his strength.
+
+"That's enough of that," Braceway raised his voice above the clatter of
+the typewriter. "Get down to the crime, or stop!"
+
+"By all means," Bristow assented.
+
+Flicking from the roller the page he had already begun, he tore it up and
+inserted another.
+
+  "I met Enid Fulton six years ago at Hot Springs, Virginia. She fell in
+   love with me.
+
+  "I had always known that a rich woman's indiscretions could be made to
+   yield big dividends. She was a victim of her----"
+
+Braceway's grasp caught the writer's hands.
+
+"Eliminate that!" he ordered sternly. "It's not necessary."
+
+Bristow, imperturbable, his motions quick and sure, tore up that page
+also, and started afresh:
+
+  "Later she believed I had embezzled in order to assure her ease and
+   luxury from the date of our marriage.
+
+  "Her exaggerated sense of fair play, of obligation, was an aid to my
+   representations of the situation.
+
+  "Although she no longer loved me and did love Withers, my hold on her,
+   rather on her purse, could not be broken.
+
+  "She gave me the money in Atlantic City and Washington. I played the
+   market, and lost. I no longer had my cunning in dealing with stocks.
+
+  "I came here as soon as I had learned of her presence in Furmville. At
+   first, she was reasonable. Abrahamson knows that. I pawned several
+   little things with him.
+
+  "At last she grew obstinate. She argued that, if she pawned any more of
+   her jewels, she would be unable to redeem them because her father had
+   failed in business.
+
+  "But I had to have funds. Several times I pointed this out to her when
+   I saw her in Number Five--always after midnight, for my own protection
+   as well as hers.
+
+  "Finally, my patience was exhausted. Last Monday night, or early
+   Tuesday morning, I told her so, quite clearly.
+
+  "She argued, plead with me. All this was in whispers. The necessity of
+   whispering so long irritated me.
+
+  "Her refusal, flat and final, to part with the jewels enraged me. It
+   was then that I made the first big mistake of my life.
+
+  "I lost my temper. Men who can not control their tempers under the most
+   trying circumstances should let crime alone. They will fail.
+
+  "I killed her--a foolish result of the folly of yielding to my rage.
+
+  "Standing there and looking at her, I pondered, with all the clarity I
+   could command. In a second, I perceived the advisability of throwing
+   the blame upon some other person."
+
+The faces of Braceway and Fulton mirrored to the others the horror of the
+stuff they were reading. The scene taxed the emotional balance of all of
+them. The evil-faced man at the typewriter, the father getting by degrees
+the description of his daughter's death, the policemen waiting to put the
+murderer behind bars----
+
+Abrahamson, peculiarly wrought upon by the tenseness of it all, wished he
+had not come. His back felt creepy. He lit a cigarette, puffed it to a
+torch and threw it down.
+
+Bristow wrote on:
+
+  "Mechanically, my fingers went to a pocket in my vest and played with
+   two metal buttons I had picked up in my kitchen the day before,
+   Monday.
+
+  "I knew the buttons had come from the overalls of the negro, Perry
+   Carpenter. It would be easy to drop one there, the other on the floor
+   of my kitchen, where I had originally found them.
+
+  "That would be the beginning of identifying him as the murderer. He had
+   been half-drunk the day before.
+
+  "The rest was simple--dropping the lavalliere links back of Number
+   Five, placing the lavalliere in the yard of his house, and so on.
+
+  "I had one piece of luck which, of course, I did not count on when I
+   first adopted this simple course. That was when Greenleaf asked me
+   to help him in finding the murderer. A confiding soul-your
+   Greenleaf--and insured by nature against brain storms.
+
+  "Such a turn was a godsend. I had become the investigator of my own
+   crime.
+
+  "There remains to be told only the fact that I made a second trip to
+   Number Five.
+
+  "Having come back here in safety, I perceived I had left there without
+   the jewels she was wearing and without those in her jewel cabinet.
+
+  "She had brought this cabinet into the living room to show me how her
+   supply of jewelry had been depleted.
+
+  "To murder and not get the fruits of it, is like picking one's own
+   pocket. I returned immediately and rectified the mistake.
+
+  "Before departing this last time, I switched on the lights to assure
+   myself that I had left only the clue to the negro's presence, none to
+   my own.
+
+  "That explains Withers' story of his struggle at the foot of the steps.
+   We really had it.
+
+  "In the ordinary course of events, the negro would have gone to the
+   chair.
+
+  "But there were complications I did not foresee.
+
+  "Morley's theft and clamour for money from Miss Fulton, Withers'
+   jealousy, and my own extra precaution of appearing with beard and gold
+   tooth in the Brevord Hotel, so as to shift suspicion to a mysterious
+   'unknown' in case of necessity; all these things left too many clues,
+   presented an embarrassment of riches.
+
+  "If I had known of them in advance, either Morley or Withers would have
+   paid the penalty for the crime. The negro would never have received my
+   attention.
+
+  "I have no game leg, never have had. The brace made it easy for me to
+   transform myself into an agile, powerful man in my 'private' work.
+
+  "I have no tuberculosis, never have had. I have a normally flat chest.
+   Sluggish veins and capillaries in my face, caused by my having
+   suffered pathological blushing for ten years, cause a permanent flush
+   in my cheeks.
+
+  "That was enough to fool the physicians. Besides, when the Galenites
+   have once diagnosed your purse favourably, your disease is what you
+   please.
+
+  "I have said my first great mistake was losing my temper with Enid
+   Withers.
+
+  "My second was my laughter in the cab the night Braceway and I
+   questioned Morley. I knew he was holding back something, but I never
+   dreamed it was his knowledge of my having done the murder.
+
+  "That laugh was suicidal, for it was the disarming of myself by myself.
+
+  "But for the albino discovery by Braceway, my conviction would have
+   been impossible. The case against Perry was too strong.
+
+  "Still, it is as well this way as another. I should never have served
+   the time for embezzlement. A free life is a fine thing. I suspect that
+   death, perhaps, is even finer."
+
+He handed the last page to Braceway, leaned back in his chair, put up his
+arms and yawned. The glance with which he swept the faces of those before
+him was arrogant. It had a sinister audacity.
+
+"The confession's complete," Braceway told Greenleaf, clipping his words
+short. "Take him away. No--wait!" He pulled a pen from his pocket and
+turned to the prisoner.
+
+"Oh, the signature," Bristow said coolly. "I forgot that."
+
+He took the typewritten pages roughly from Fulton, and in a bold, free
+hand wrote at the bottom of each: "Thomas F. Splain."
+
+"I'm ready," he announced, rising from his chair so that he jostled
+Fulton unnecessarily.
+
+The old man, his self-control broken at last, struck him with open hand
+full in the face. His fingers left three red stripes across the
+murderer's white cheek.
+
+Before Braceway could interfere, Bristow checked his impulse to strike
+back and gave Fulton a long, level look.
+
+"You're welcome to it," he said finally; "welcome, old man. I guess I
+still owe you something, at that."
+
+"Put the cuffs on him," ordered Greenleaf.
+
+"First, though, I'd like to have a clean collar, some clean linen; and I
+want to get rid of this brace," Bristow interrupted.
+
+"To hell with what you want!" Greenleaf cried, a shade more purple with
+rage.
+
+Bristow turned to Braceway:
+
+"You're right. The stuff's in the sole of this shoe."
+
+"Let's take charge of that now," Braceway said to the chief. They each
+grasped one of the prisoner's arms and hustled him with scant ceremony
+to his bedroom. Bristow removed his trousers and, unbuckling the belt and
+straps of the steel brace, took off the thick-soled shoe.
+
+Greenleaf put his hand into it and tugged at the inner sole.
+
+"Opens on the outside," prompted Braceway, "underneath, near the instep."
+
+The chief, after fumbling with it a moment, got it open. The jewels
+streamed to the floor, a little cascade of radiance and colour. He picked
+them up, getting down on all-fours so as not to miss one.
+
+"Don't be unreasonable," Bristow complained as he slipped on another
+shoe. "Let me have a clean shirt and collar."
+
+"Be quick about it," Braceway consented, his voice heavy with contempt.
+
+Greenleaf, holding him again by one arm, shoved him toward the bureau. He
+got out of his shirt, Greenleaf shifting his grasp so as not to let go of
+him for a second. In trying to put the front collar button into the fresh
+shirt, he broke off its head.
+
+"Come on," growled the chief. "You don't need a collar anyway."
+
+"Not so fast! I've more than one collar button."
+
+He put his hand into a tray and picked up another. It had a long shank
+and was easily manipulated because of the catch that permitted the
+movement of its head, as if on a hinge.
+
+"This is better," he said, fingering it, unhurried as a man with hours to
+throw away.
+
+"Get a move on! Get a move!" Greenleaf growled again, tightening his hold
+until it was painful.
+
+Bristow, apparently bent on throwing off this rough grasp on his left
+arm, swiftly raised his right hand with the button to his mouth.
+
+For the fraction of a second his eyes, bright and defiant, met
+Braceway's. The detective, reading the elation in them, shouted:
+
+"Look out!"
+
+There was a click. And Bristow flung away the button as Braceway caught
+at his hand.
+
+"I beat you after----" he tried to boast.
+
+But the poison, quicker than he had thought, cut short his utterance. His
+eyelids flickered twice. He collapsed against Greenleaf and slid,
+crumpled, to the floor.
+
+"Cyanide," said Braceway. "He had it in the shank of that collar button."
+
+Greenleaf bent over him.
+
+"God, it's quick!" he announced. "He's dead."
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WINNING CLUE***
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+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Winning Clue, by James Hay, Jr.</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: The Winning Clue</p>
+<p>Author: James Hay, Jr.</p>
+<p>Release Date: December 20, 2006  [eBook #20152]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WINNING CLUE***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3>E-text prepared by David Garcia, Mary Meehan,<br />
+    and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
+    (http://www.pgdp.net/c/)</h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h1>THE WINNING CLUE</h1>
+
+<h2>BY JAMES HAY, <span class="smcap">Jr.</span></h2>
+
+<h3>AUTHOR OF THE MAN WHO FORGOT, <span class="smcap">Etc.</span></h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h4>
+GROSSET &amp; DUNLAP<br />
+PUBLISHERS NEW YORK<br />
+<span class="smcap">Copyright</span>, 1919<br />
+By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, <span class="smcap">Inc.</span></h4>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<h4>
+TO GRAHAM B. NICHOL<br />
+AS A LITTLE TOKEN OF MY ADMIRATION AND AFFECTION</h4>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. -->
+<p>
+<a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I. <span class="smcap">Strangled</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II. "<span class="smcap">Something Big in It</span>"</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III. <span class="smcap">The Ruby Ring</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV. <span class="smcap">Two Trails</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V. <span class="smcap">The Husband's Story</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.  <span class="smcap">Morley Is in a Hurry</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII. <span class="smcap">Miss Fulton Is Hysterical</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII. <span class="smcap">The Breath of Scandal</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX. <span class="smcap">Women's Nerves</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X. <span class="smcap">Eyes of Accusation</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI. <span class="smcap">The $1,000 Check</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII. <span class="smcap">The Man with the Gold Tooth</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII. <span class="smcap">Lucy Thomas Talks</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV. <span class="smcap">The Pawn Broker Takes the Trail</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV. <span class="smcap">Braceway Sees a Light</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI. <span class="smcap">A Message from Miss Fulton</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII. <span class="smcap">Miss Fulton's Revelation</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII. <span class="smcap">What's Braceway's Game</span>?</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX. <span class="smcap">At the Anderson National Bank</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX. <span class="smcap">The Discovery of the Jewels</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">CHAPTER XXI. <span class="smcap">Bristow Solves a Problem</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">CHAPTER XXII. <span class="smcap">A Confession</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">CHAPTER XXIII. <span class="smcap">On the Rack</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">CHAPTER XXIV.  <span class="smcap">Miss Fulton Writes a Letter</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXV">CHAPTER XXV. <span class="smcap">A Mystifying Telegram</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI">CHAPTER XXVI. <span class="smcap">Wanted: Vengeance</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII">CHAPTER XXVII. <span class="smcap">The Revelation</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII">CHAPTER XXVIII. <span class="smcap">Confession Voluntary</span></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">CHAPTER XXIX. <span class="smcap">The Last Card</span></a><br />
+</p>
+<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. -->
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>THE WINNING CLUE</h2>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+<h3>STRANGLED</h3>
+
+
+<p>When a woman's voice, pitched to the high note of utter terror, rang out
+on the late morning quiet of Manniston Road, Lawrence Bristow looked up
+from his newspaper quickly but vaguely, as if he doubted his own ears. He
+was reading an account of a murder committed in Waukesha, Wisconsin, and
+the shrieks he had just heard fitted in so well with the paragraph then
+before his eyes that his imagination might have been playing him tricks.
+He was allowed, however, little time for speculation or doubt.</p>
+
+<p>"Murder! Help!" cried the woman in a staccato sharpness that carried the
+length of many blocks.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow sprang to his feet and started down the short flight of stairs
+leading from his porch to the street. Before he had taken three steps, he
+saw the frightened girl standing on the porch of No. 5, two doors to his
+left. Although he was lame, he displayed surprising agility. His left
+leg, two inches shorter than the right and supported by a steel brace
+from foot to thigh, did not prevent his being the first to reach the
+young woman's side.</p>
+
+<p>Late as it was, half-past ten, she was not fully dressed. She wore a
+kimono of light, sheer material which, clutched spasmodically about her,
+revealed the slightness and grace of her figure. Her fair hair hung down
+her back in a long, thick braid.</p>
+
+<p>Neighbours across the street and further up Manniston Road were out on
+their porches now or starting toward No. 5. All of them were women.</p>
+
+<p>The girl&mdash;she was barely past twenty, he thought&mdash;stopped screaming, and,
+her hands pressed to her throat and cheeks, stared wildly from him toward
+the front door, which was standing open. He entered the living room of
+the one-story bungalow. A foot within the doorway, he stood stock still.
+On the sofa against the opposite wall he saw another woman. He knew at
+first glance that she was dead.</p>
+
+<p>The body was in a curious position. Apparently, before death had come,
+the victim had been sitting on the sofa, and, in dying, her body had
+crumpled over from the waist toward the right, so that now the lower part
+of her occupied the attitude of sitting while the upper half reclined as
+if in the posture of natural sleep. One thing which, perhaps, added to
+the gruesomeness of the sight was that she had on evening dress, a gown
+of pale blue satin embellished in unerring taste with real old Irish
+lace.</p>
+
+<p>Although the face had been beautiful under its crown of luxuriant black
+hair, it now was distorted. While the eyes were closed, the mouth was
+open, very wide&mdash;an ugly, repulsive gape.</p>
+
+<p>He was aware that the woman in the kimono was just behind him&mdash;he could
+feel her hot breath against the back of his neck&mdash;and that behind her
+pressed the neighbours, their number augmented by the arrival of two men.
+He turned and faced them.</p>
+
+<p>"Call a doctor&mdash;and the police, somebody, will you?" he said sharply.</p>
+
+<p>"They have a telephone back there in the dining room," volunteered one of
+the women on the porch.</p>
+
+<p>Another, a Mrs. Allen who lived in No. 6, had put her arms around the
+terrified girl and was forcing her into an armchair on the porch.</p>
+
+<p>The others started into the living room.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait a moment," cautioned Bristow. "Don't come in here yet. The police
+will want to find things undisturbed. It looks like murder."</p>
+
+<p>They obeyed him without question. He was about forty years old, of medium
+height and with good shoulders, but his chest was too flat, and his face
+showed an unnatural flush. His mere physique was not one to force
+obedience from others. It was in his eyes, dark-brown and lit with a
+peculiar flaming intensity, that they read his right to command.</p>
+
+<p>"Please go through this room to the telephone and call a doctor," he
+said, singling out the woman who had spoken.</p>
+
+<p>His voice, a deep barytone with a pleasant note, was perfectly steady. He
+seemed to hold their excitement easily within bounds.</p>
+
+<p>The woman he had addressed complied with his suggestion. While she was
+doing so, he crossed over to the sofa and put his hand to the wrist of
+the murdered woman. In order to do that, he had to move a fold of the
+gown which partially concealed it. The flesh was cold, and he shivered
+slightly, readjusting the satin to exactly the fold in which he had found
+it.</p>
+
+<p>"Too late for a doctor to help now," he threw back over his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>They watched him silently. Low moans were coming constantly from the
+woman in the chair on the porch.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow took the telephone in his turn and called up police headquarters.</p>
+
+<p>The chief of police, whom he knew, answered the call.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello! Captain Greenleaf?" asked the lame man.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"There's been a murder at Number Five, Manniston Road. This is Lawrence
+Bristow, of Number Nine."</p>
+
+<p>"Aw, quit your kiddin'," laughed Greenleaf. "What do you want to do, get
+me up there to hear another of your theories about&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"This is no joke," snapped Bristow. "I tell you one of the women in
+Number Five has been murdered. Come&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>But the chief, recognizing the urgency in the summons, had left the
+telephone and was on his way.</p>
+
+<p>As Bristow turned toward the living room, Mrs. Allen and another woman
+were carrying the hysterical, moaning girl from the front porch to one
+of the two bedrooms in the bungalow. Some of the others again started
+into the living room.</p>
+
+<p>"Let's wait," he cautioned once more. "If we get to moving around in here
+we may destroy any clues that could be used later."</p>
+
+<p>When they fell back a little, he joined them on the porch, standing
+always so that he could watch the body and see that no one changed its
+attitude or even approached it. His eyes studied keenly all the furniture
+in the room. Save for one overturned stiff-backed chair, it apparently
+had not been disturbed.</p>
+
+<p>The doctor arrived and, waiting for no information, approached the
+murdered woman. As Bristow had done, he touched her wrist, and then
+slipped his hand beneath her corsage so that it rested above her heart.
+He straightened up almost immediately.</p>
+
+<p>"Dead," he said to Bristow; "dead for hours."</p>
+
+<p>The physician became conscious of the hysterical girl's moans, took a
+step toward the bedrooms and paused.</p>
+
+<p>"That's right, doctor," Bristow told him. "They need you back there."</p>
+
+<p>The doctor hurried out.</p>
+
+<p>"That is&mdash;that was Mrs. Withers, wasn't it?" Bristow, looking at the dead
+body, asked of the group.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; and the other is her sister, Miss Fulton," one of them answered.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow had seemed to all of them a peculiar man&mdash;too quiet and
+reserved&mdash;ever since he had come to No. 9 four months before. They
+remembered this now, when he seemed scarcely conscious of the identity of
+the two girls who had lived almost next door to him during all that time.</p>
+
+<p>Different members of the crowd gave him information: Miss Maria Fulton,
+like nearly everybody else on Manniston Road, had tuberculosis, and Mrs.
+Withers had been living with her. They had plenty of money&mdash;not rich,
+perhaps, but able to have all the comforts and most of the luxuries of
+life. They were here in the hope that Furmville's climate would restore
+Miss Fulton's health.</p>
+
+<p>Their coloured cook-and-maid had not come to work that morning, it
+seemed, and Miss Fulton, who was the younger of the two sisters, was on
+the "rest" cure, ordered by the doctor to stay in bed day and night.
+Perhaps that was why she had not discovered Mrs. Withers' body earlier in
+the day.</p>
+
+<p>They gossiped on.</p>
+
+<p>It was like a lesson in immortality&mdash;the dead body, with distorted face
+and twisted limbs, just inside the room; and outside, in the low-toned
+phrases of the awed women, swift and vivid pictures of what she; when
+alive, had said and done and seemed.</p>
+
+<p>"Everybody liked her. If somebody had come and told me a woman living on
+Manniston Road had been killed, she would have been the last one I'd have
+thought of as the victim." "All the other beautiful women I ever knew
+were stupid; she wasn't." "Her husband couldn't come to Furmville very
+often." "Loveliest black hair I <i>ever</i> saw." "She used to be&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Then followed quick glimpses of her life as they had seen or heard it: a
+dance at Maplewood Inn where she had been the undisputed belle; a novel
+she had liked; a big reception at the White House in Washington when,
+during the year of her d&eacute;but, the French ambassador had called her "the
+most beautiful American," and the newspapers had made much of it; an
+emerald ring she had worn; the unfailing good humour she had always shown
+in the tedious routine of nursing her sister&mdash;and so on, a mass of facts
+and impressions which were, simultaneously, a little biography of her and
+an unaffected appreciation of the way she had touched and coloured their
+lives.</p>
+
+<p>Captain Greenleaf, with one of the plain-clothes men of his force, came
+hurrying up the steps. The crowd fell back, gave them passage, and closed
+in again.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing's been disturbed, captain," said Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"Where is she?" asked Greenleaf anxiously. He was not accustomed to
+murder cases.</p>
+
+<p>He caught sight of the body on the sofa.</p>
+
+<p>"God!" he said in a low tone, and turned toward the plain-clothes man:</p>
+
+<p>"Come on in, Jenkins&mdash;you, too, Mr. Bristow."</p>
+
+<p>The three entered the living room, and Greenleaf, with a muttered word of
+apology to the on-lookers, closed the door in their faces.</p>
+
+<p>He, too, did what Bristow had done&mdash;put his fingers on the dead woman's
+wrist. He was breathing rapidly, and his hand shook. Jenkins stood
+motionless. He also was overwhelmed by the tragedy. Besides, he was not
+cut out for work of this kind. In looking for illicit distillers and
+boot-leggers, or negroes charged with theft, he was in his element, but
+this sort of thing was new to him. He had no idea of where to turn or
+what to do.</p>
+
+<p>"She's dead," Bristow said to the captain. "The doctor says she has been
+dead a long time&mdash;hours."</p>
+
+<p>"Where's the doctor?"</p>
+
+<p>"Back there. Miss Fulton, the sister, is hysterical with fright."</p>
+
+<p>"Who sent for the doctor?"</p>
+
+<p>"I did. I asked one of the women here to telephone."</p>
+
+<p>"Then I'll call the coroner."</p>
+
+<p>He stepped through the open folding doors into the dining room and
+took down the receiver, looking, as he did so, at the body and its
+surroundings.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow stooped down, picked up something from the floor near the sofa
+and dropped it into his vest pocket.</p>
+
+<p>The doctor&mdash;Dr. Braley&mdash;returned as the captain hung up the telephone
+receiver.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton is quieter now," he announced.</p>
+
+<p>"Doctor," requested Greenleaf, "look at this body, will you? What caused
+death?"</p>
+
+<p>Braley, a thin, quick-moving little man of thirty-five, bent over the
+dead woman, lifted one of her eyelids, and examined her throat as far as
+was possible without moving the head.</p>
+
+<p>"She was choked to death," he gave his opinion. "Although the eyes are
+closed, you see the effect they produce of almost starting from their
+sockets. And the tongue protrudes. Besides, there are the marks on her
+throat. You can see them there on the left side."</p>
+
+<p>"How long has she been dead?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't say definitely. I should guess about eight or ten hours anyway."</p>
+
+<p>That staggered Greenleaf, the idea of this woman dead here in the front
+room of a bungalow on Manniston Road for eight or ten hours&mdash;and nobody
+knew anything about it! His agitation grew. He felt the need of doing
+something, starting something.</p>
+
+<p>"How about Miss Fulton?" he asked. "Can I get a statement from her?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not just yet. Give her a little more time to get herself together.
+Besides, she told me something about the&mdash;er&mdash;affair. Most remarkable
+statement&mdash;most remarkable."</p>
+
+<p>"What was it?"</p>
+
+<p>"She says," related Braley, "that she only discovered the dead body of
+her sister a few minutes before she was heard crying for help. Her
+sister, Mrs. Withers, went to a dance, one of the regular Monday night
+dances at the inn&mdash;Maplewood Inn. She went with Mr. Campbell, Douglas
+Campbell, the real estate man here. You know him. They left the house at
+nine o'clock last night. That was the last time Miss Fulton saw Mrs.
+Withers alive.</p>
+
+<p>"In the meantime, Miss Fulton herself, who is under my orders to stay in
+bed all the time, was up and dressed so that she might spend the evening
+with a friend of hers from Washington. His name is Henry Morley. He left
+this house a little after eleven o'clock, and he left Furmville on the
+midnight train for Washington.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton, thoroughly tired out, went to bed and was asleep by
+half-past eleven. As she has something which she uses when she wants a
+good sleep, she took some of it last night and did not wake up until
+after ten this morning. She didn't even hear her sister come in last
+night.</p>
+
+<p>"When she awoke this morning, she called her sister. Amazed by receiving
+no answer, she got up to investigate. Mrs. Withers' bed had not been
+occupied. She then came in here and found the body."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean to say," put in Bristow, "that this sick girl was here all
+night and heard nothing?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's what she says," confirmed the physician.</p>
+
+<p>"Did she give any idea who the murderer might be?" queried Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"No; she's not sufficiently clear in her mind to advance any theories
+yet&mdash;naturally."</p>
+
+<p>"Let me look around," suggested the captain.</p>
+
+<p>He did so, followed by Bristow and the doctor. Save for the overturned
+chair, between the sofa and the dining room door, the furniture, for the
+most part the mission stuff generally found in the furnished-for-rent
+cottages in Furmville, had not been knocked about in a struggle. That was
+evident. The two rugs on the floor had not been disturbed. None of the
+three men touched the overturned chair.</p>
+
+<p>All the windows of the living room and the dining room were closed but
+not locked, as there was on the outside of each the usual covering of
+mosquito wiring. The shades were down. The front door did not have the
+inside "catch" thrown on.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf examined the kitchen, the unoccupied bedroom, the bathroom, and
+the sleeping porch at the back of the house. This last, like the windows,
+was inclosed in stout wire screens, and nowhere, on either the windows or
+the sleeping porch, had this screening been broken. The kitchen door was
+locked. There was no sign of a struggle anywhere. These negative facts
+were gathered quickly.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Allen, summoned from the sister's side, reported that there were no
+signs of an entrance having been made through any of the three windows
+in the bedroom in which Miss Fulton now lay quiet.</p>
+
+<p>They made their way back to the living room. In spite of the most
+painstaking examination of the floor, walls, and furniture of the entire
+bungalow, they were, so far, without a clue. The murderer had left not
+the slightest trace of his identity or his manner of entrance to the
+death chamber.</p>
+
+<p>"As I see it," said the captain when they rejoined Jenkins, "nobody broke
+into this house last night. But two men had admission to it. They were
+Mr. Douglas Campbell, the real estate man, and Mr. Henry Morley, who was
+calling on Miss Fulton. It's up to those two to tell what they know."</p>
+
+<p>"But," objected the doctor, "Miss Fulton says Morley left town last
+night."</p>
+
+<p>"Humph! Maybe that makes it look all the worse for Morley."</p>
+
+<p>"But," suggested Bristow, "if we find that the front door was unlocked
+all night, the possibilities broaden."</p>
+
+<p>"How will we find that out?"</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton might remember about it."</p>
+
+<p>"She did mention that," put in Braley; "it was unlocked."</p>
+
+<p>"All the same," insisted Greenleaf, "Morley's got to come back here.
+Wouldn't you say so?" This question was addressed to Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>The telephone bell rang in the dining room. The chief went to answer it.</p>
+
+<p>"What's that?" Those in the living room heard him. "You? I'm the chief of
+police. Where are you now? Oh, I see. Come up here, will you? There's
+been a murder here. Mrs. Withers. Right away? All right; I'll wait for
+you."</p>
+
+<p>He came back to the living room.</p>
+
+<p>"That was Mr. Henry Morley," he said, "Didn't leave town last night. What
+do you think of that?"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+<h3>"SOMETHING BIG IN IT"</h3>
+
+
+<p>Before the question was answered the coroner arrived. While Chief
+Greenleaf told him the circumstances confronting them, Dr. Braley
+telephoned for a trained nurse for Miss Fulton. In the absence of anybody
+else to perform the unpleasant task, the doctor went back to take up with
+the bereaved girl the matter of telegraphing to her family and the
+details of preparing the murdered woman's body for burial as soon as
+would be compatible with the plans of the coroner.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder, Mr. Bristow," suggested Greenleaf, "if I couldn't walk up to
+your place with you and talk this thing over."</p>
+
+<p>"Glad to have you," agreed Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>The crowd on the porch and in the street began to disperse slowly after
+the chief had told them none of them could be admitted. In small groups,
+they made their way to porches or into houses where they lingered,
+speculating, wondering, advancing impossible theories.</p>
+
+<p>Why had death singled <i>her</i> out? Who would ever have suspected that there
+had been in her life any foothold for tragedy? The secrecy with which she
+had been struck down, the ease of the murderer's coming and going safely,
+roused their resentment. They sympathized with themselves as well as with
+the dead woman.</p>
+
+<p>Confusedly, but at the same time with striking unanimity, they felt that
+this was not merely a mystery, but a mystery made ugly and shocking by
+base motives and despicable agents. In common with all mankind, they
+resented mystery. It emphasized their own dependence on chance. They
+began to guess at the best method for capturing the guilty.</p>
+
+<p>The chief of police and the lame man had reached the porch of No. 9.
+There Bristow picked up from a table a scrapbook and a bundle of
+newspaper clippings. Following him into the living room, Greenleaf
+brought a paste pot and a pair of shears which the other evidently had
+been using in placing the clippings in the big book. He put them down on
+a table in one corner near Bristow's typewriter.</p>
+
+<p>"Still figuring 'em out, I see," he said grimly.</p>
+
+<p>He referred to Bristow's habit of reading murder mysteries in the
+newspapers and working them out to satisfactory solutions. That was
+Bristow's way of amusing himself while set down in Furmville for the long
+struggle to overcome the tuberculosis with which he was afflicted. In
+fact, as a result of this recreation, he had become known to Greenleaf,
+who had visited him several times.</p>
+
+<p>He had rendered the captain considerable assistance in a minor case
+shortly after his arrival in the town, and Greenleaf was really amazed by
+the correctness of the lame man's solutions of most of the murder cases
+chronicled. He knew that Bristow had been right on an average of nine
+times out of ten, often clearing up the affairs on paper many days or
+even weeks ahead of the authorities in various parts of the country.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow had his records in his scrapbooks to prove his contentions. Under
+each clipping descriptive of a baffling murder he had written a brief
+outline of his solving of the case and dated it, following this with the
+date of the correct or incorrect solutions by the authorities.</p>
+
+<p>"But now," the chief added, as they sat down before the open fire, which
+earlier had fought against the chill of the cool May morning, "you can
+work one out right on the ground. And I'll be mighty glad to have your
+help&mdash;if you will help."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," said Bristow. "I'll be more than glad to make any
+suggestions I can."</p>
+
+<p>The chief went out on the porch and called across the yard of No. 7 to
+one of his men on guard at No. 5:</p>
+
+<p>"Simpson, when a young man&mdash;name's Morley&mdash;gets there and asks for me,
+tell him to come up here to Number Nine."</p>
+
+<p>He came back and referred to Bristow's offer of help:</p>
+
+<p>"For instance?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well," Bristow answered, "as we see it now, there are three
+possibilities: Campbell, or Morley, or some unknown man or woman,
+coloured or white, bent on robbery."</p>
+
+<p>"So far, though, we haven't found any signs of robbery."</p>
+
+<p>"I have."</p>
+
+<p>"What were they?"</p>
+
+<p>"The middle, third and little fingers of Mrs. Withers' left hand were
+scratched, badly scratched, as if rings had been pulled from them by
+force. And there was a deep line on the back of her neck. It looked black
+just now, but it was red when it was inflicted. It was too thin to have
+been made by a finger, but it might have been caused by somebody's having
+tugged at a chain about her neck until it broke."</p>
+
+<p>"The thunder you say! I didn't notice any of that."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll show you the marks when we go back there."</p>
+
+<p>"But," objected Greenleaf, "I know Mr. Campbell. He's not the sort to
+steal. And I don't suppose Morley is."</p>
+
+<p>"They say the same thing about bank presidents," Bristow replied with a
+slight smile, "but some of them get caught at it, nevertheless."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; but this is different&mdash;unless the murdered woman had extremely
+valuable jewelry."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true. Besides, if the front door was unlocked all night, or, even
+if somebody knocked at the door and Mrs. Withers answered it, there is
+your third possibility, any ordinary robbery and murder."</p>
+
+<p>"I believe that's what will come out," Greenleaf said, his troubled face
+showing his worried consciousness of inability to handle the situation;
+"but how will we&mdash;how will I prove it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Morley and Campbell can make their own statements."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, going to the dining room door, called toward the kitchen:</p>
+
+<p>"Mattie!"</p>
+
+<p>Replying to his summons, a middle-aged coloured woman appeared.</p>
+
+<p>"Mattie, didn't I hear Perry tell you yesterday that he was to go to work
+this morning for Mrs. Withers, 'making' her garden?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh," answered Mattie, still breathing heavily from her hurried
+return from No. 5.</p>
+
+<p>"Has he been around this morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know where Mrs. Withers' servant lives?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh."</p>
+
+<p>"What's her name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Lucy Thomas, suh."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I want you to go there right away and find out what's the matter
+with her, why she didn't show up for work this morning. Take your time.
+Dinner can wait."</p>
+
+<p>When Mattie had gone, Bristow explained:</p>
+
+<p>"This Perry&mdash;Perry Carpenter&mdash;is a young negro who does odd jobs in this
+section. He's about twenty-five, I guess. Each of these bungalows has a
+garden back of it, you know. There are no houses behind us. I don't like
+Perry's looks. He did some gardening for me Saturday and yesterday."</p>
+
+<p>"You think he&mdash;&mdash;?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's got a bad face. If neither Campbell nor Morley killed Mrs. Withers,
+why shouldn't we find out where Perry and the servant woman of Number
+Five are now, and where they were all last night?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon that's right," chimed in Greenleaf. "It looks something like a
+common darky job at that."</p>
+
+<p>"And this," added Bristow, taking something from his vest pocket and
+handing it to the chief of police, "looks more like it, doesn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf examined the object the other had put into his hand. It was a
+metal button of the kind ordinarily worn on overall jumpers, and clinging
+to it were a few fragments of the dark blue stuff of which overalls are
+commonly made. On the back of the button were stamped in white the words:
+"National Overalls Company."</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you get this?" asked the chief.</p>
+
+<p>"I picked it up in the room where the dead girl was; and I'd forgotten it
+until this minute. It was on the floor a few yards from the body. You saw
+me when I picked it up. You were at the telephone."</p>
+
+<p>"That's right. I remember now. By cracky! That came off of some darky's
+working clothes. That's sure!"</p>
+
+<p>"The only trouble is," puzzled Bristow, "your negro doesn't wear overalls
+at night after he has finished work. He dresses up and loafs down town."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true on Saturday nights. Other nights they don't take the trouble
+to change. And last night was Monday night. No, sir! That's our first
+clue, that button; the first sign we've had of the murderer."</p>
+
+<p>"Keep it," Bristow told him. "I'm not as confident as you are, but you
+might have a look at the blouse of Perry's suit of overalls. We can't
+over-look anything now."</p>
+
+<p>Deep in thought he gazed at the fire. Greenleaf got up and walked to the
+window, which gave a magnificent view of the great Carolina mountains in
+the distance. He was not admiring the mountains, however. He was
+wondering why Mr. Morley had not arrived.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way," he said, "can't I get a drink of water?"</p>
+
+<p>He was in the dining room on his way to the kitchen before Bristow roused
+himself from his reverie.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait!" he called to the chief. "Let me get it for you."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, however, had gone into the kitchen. Bristow followed him and
+took a tumbler from a rack on the wall.</p>
+
+<p>The chief drew the tumbler full twice from the faucet and gulped down the
+water. His hand shook. He was very nervous.</p>
+
+<p>As they turned to leave the kitchen, he uttered an exclamation and,
+stooping down swiftly, pulled something from under the stove. When he
+straightened up, he had in his hand another metal button. He turned it
+about in his fingers, studying it.</p>
+
+<p>"It looks like the one you found in Number Five," he said.</p>
+
+<p>They compared the two. They were identical. The two men stared at each
+other.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you make of that?" asked Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"I was wondering," Bristow replied, thinking quickly, "when&mdash;how that got
+there." He paused and added: "Mattie doesn't wear overalls."</p>
+
+<p>They returned to the living room.</p>
+
+<p>"But," he continued, "Perry was working for me yesterday. He was in the
+kitchen talking to Mattie. I wonder&mdash;Well, there's one thing; if Perry's
+blouse has two buttons missing, he'll be confronted with the job of
+establishing an alibi for all of last night."</p>
+
+<p>"By cracky!" The captain slapped his hands together in evident relief.
+"I believe we've got him! I'm going to send a man after him."</p>
+
+<p>He went out to the porch and signalled another of his men.</p>
+
+<p>"Drake," he said, "I want you to find a young negro&mdash;name's Perry
+Carpenter&mdash;about twenty-five years old. He does odd jobs around here. Any
+of these other niggers can tell you where he lives. When you find him,
+take him to headquarters. Keep him there until I come. Get him. Don't
+lose him!"</p>
+
+<p>When he stepped back into the house, Bristow was regarding him with a
+smile.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope you're right," he told the chief, "but I've a hunch you're wrong.
+I believe this murder is more than an ordinary robbery by a darky.
+Somehow, I have the impression that there's something big mixed up in
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't say exactly. Perhaps it's because I've been thinking of the
+beauty of the victim. Or it may be that I was impressed by what the women
+said about her when we were waiting for you on the porch."</p>
+
+<p>He thought a while, and decided that he had no explanation of why he
+had made the remark. He had not meant to say it. It had come from him
+spontaneously, like an endorsement of what all Manniston Road was saying
+at that very moment: the "the something big in it" loomed up, intangible
+but demanding notice.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf himself, for all his apparent certainty about the guilt of the
+negro Perry, sensed vaguely the possibility, the hint, that this crime
+was even worse than it appeared to be. But he would not admit it. He
+preferred to keep before his mind the easier answer to the puzzle.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he contradicted Bristow; "I believe Perry's the fellow we want.
+Here we are dealing with facts, not story-book romances."</p>
+
+<p>Just then a young man sprang up the steps of No. 9 and knocked on the
+door. It was Henry Morley, come to give weight to Bristow's "hunch."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2>
+
+<h3>THE RUBY RING</h3>
+
+
+<p>Although it was Chief Greenleaf who opened the door, it was to Bristow
+that Morley turned, as if he instinctively recognized the superiority of
+the lame man's personality. Greenleaf, of average height and weight, had
+nothing of command or domination about him. With his red, weatherbeaten
+face and mild, expressionless blue eyes, he looked like a well-to-do
+farmer. He was suggestive of no acquaintance with Tarde, Lombroso or any
+other authorities on crime and criminals.</p>
+
+<p>"Won't you sit down?" invited Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>The new-comer was tall and slender. In spite of a straight, high-bridged
+nose and thin lips, his face indicated weakness. His dark-gray eyes had
+in them either a great deal of worry or undisguised fear. As he took the
+chair pointed out to him, he was being catalogued by Bristow as showing
+too much uncertainty, even a womanish timidity. Bristow noticed also that
+his thick, soft blond hair was carefully parted and brushed, and that his
+fingers were much manicured.</p>
+
+<p>He breathed in short, quick gasps.</p>
+
+<p>"What is it? How&mdash;how did it happen?" he asked, his gaze still on
+Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf took a seat so that Morley sat between him and Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"We don't know how it happened," said the chief. "We wanted to know if
+you could tell us anything."</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't see Mrs. Withers late last night," Morley replied, a nervous
+tremor in his voice.</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody said you did," commented Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"No; I know that," Morley agreed in a queer, high voice.</p>
+
+<p>"But you were in the house, Number Five, last evening, weren't you?"
+Bristow inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, tell us about it."</p>
+
+<p>"I came down here from Washington Saturday," the young man began. "I
+didn't come to see Mrs. Withers. I came to see Miss Fulton, her sister.
+Of course, I've seen Mrs. Withers since I've been here; I saw her early
+last night. You see, last night she went up to the Maplewood Inn for the
+dinner dance, and, when I called, she was just leaving with a Mr.
+Campbell. Miss Fulton and I sat on the front porch and in the parlour
+talking until a little after eleven."</p>
+
+<p>"We understood," put in Bristow, "that Miss Fulton was confined to her
+bed."</p>
+
+<p>"She was, that is&mdash;er&mdash;she was supposed to be; but she got up last
+evening and dressed to receive me."</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon," again interrupted his questioner, "but everything is
+important here now, and we need information. We have so little of it as
+yet. I really apologize, but may I ask what your relations with Miss
+Fulton are?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley hesitated a full minute before he answered.</p>
+
+<p>"If it is to go no further than you gentlemen," he began.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," the other two agreed.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, Miss Fulton and I are engaged to be married."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! Go ahead." This from the lame man.</p>
+
+<p>"As I said, we talked until a little after eleven. Then I had to leave to
+catch the midnight train back to Washington."</p>
+
+<p>"But you didn't catch it."</p>
+
+<p>"No. You see, I was stopping at the Maplewood. That's more than a mile
+from Manniston Road, and it's fully two miles from the railroad station.
+Somehow, I didn't allow myself enough time, and I missed the train by a
+bare two minutes."</p>
+
+<p>"What did you do then?"</p>
+
+<p>"What did I do then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;what then?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't go back to Maplewood Inn. I took a room for the night at the
+Brevord Hotel. It's near the station, you know, and I intended to catch
+the midday train today. Besides, it was late, and I didn't want to take
+the trouble of walking back or getting a machine to take me back to
+Maplewood."</p>
+
+<p>He drew out his handkerchief and mopped his forehead, which, as a matter
+of fact, was perfectly dry. He was tremendously unstrung. Bristow
+realized this and saw that now, more than at any subsequent time, he
+would be able to make the young man talk.</p>
+
+<p>"That," he said easily, "accounts for you, doesn't it? Now, I'll tell
+you. Chief Greenleaf and I are anxious to get some information about
+the Fulton family. As you know, we people here, being invalids, live
+pretty much to ourselves. We don't have the strength for much social
+life, and we don't know much about each other. What can you tell us?"</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton and Mrs. Withers are&mdash;were sisters," Morley responded.
+"Their father, William T. Fulton, is a real estate man in Washington. By
+the way, Mar&mdash;Miss Fulton expects him here this afternoon. She told me so
+yesterday. Last fall, just before Miss Fulton was taken sick with
+tuberculosis, he failed, failed for a very large amount of money."</p>
+
+<p>"He was wealthy then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; quite. Mrs. Withers was twenty-five. She married Withers, George S.
+Withers, of Atlanta, Georgia, when she was twenty-one. But, when Miss
+Fulton had to come here for her health, Mrs. Withers agreed to come, too,
+and look after her. Withers isn't wealthy. He's a lawyer in Atlanta, but
+he hasn't a big income."</p>
+
+<p>"How old is Miss Fulton?" asked Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"Twenty-three."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know whether Mrs. Withers had any valuable jewelry&mdash;rings, stuff
+of that kind?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley was for a moment visibly disturbed.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes," he answered after a little pause. "When Mr. Fulton failed,
+Miss Fulton gave up all her jewels, everything, to help meet his debts.
+Mrs. Withers refused to do this&mdash;at least, she didn't do it."</p>
+
+<p>Both Bristow and Greenleaf caught the note of criticism in his voice.</p>
+
+<p>"Just what was the feeling between the two sisters?" pursued Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>Again Morley paused.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, all right, if you don't feel like discussing that," his interrogator
+said smoothly. "It's of no consequence. We'll find out about it
+elsewhere."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose I might as well," said Morley. "It really doesn't amount to
+anything much. There has been considerable coolness between the two
+women."</p>
+
+<p>"Even when Mrs. Withers was here nursing Miss Fulton?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. You see, Mrs. Withers was and always has been Mr. Fulton's
+favourite. Miss Maria Fulton felt this, and she knew that Mrs. Withers
+came here only because Mr. Fulton asked her to do it. Also, Miss Fulton
+never forgave Mrs. Withers for not coming forward with her jewels, jewels
+which her father had given her&mdash;for not coming forward with them when he
+failed."</p>
+
+<p>"Did they ever quarrel?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes. Sometimes, I think, they did. You know how it is with two
+women, particularly sisters, who are on what might be called bad terms.
+Then, as I was about to say, Mrs. Withers wasn't making any sacrifice by
+being here with her sister. Mr. Fulton, in spite of his reduced means,
+paid her expenses, all of them. Besides, Mrs. Withers had quite a good
+time here, going to the dances, and so on."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know, Mr. Morley, whether they had a quarrel yesterday?"</p>
+
+<p>"They didn't so far as I know."</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton said nothing to you about a quarrel?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was silent a few seconds.</p>
+
+<p>"I think that's all, Mr. Morley. We're much obliged to you. Isn't that
+all, chief?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, for the present," Greenleaf answered with a long breath, thankful
+the other had been there to do the questioning. "That seems to cover
+everything."</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder if I could see Miss Fulton," Morley said, rising.</p>
+
+<p>"If the doctor will allow it," Greenleaf told him. "You might go down
+there and see."</p>
+
+<p>Morley put his hand on the doorknob.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way," interjected Bristow once more, and this time his voice was
+cold, steely; "Mr. Morley, did you wear rubbers last night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Rubbers?" parroted Morley.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;rubbers."</p>
+
+<p>Morley stared a moment, as if calculating something.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes; I believe I did," he said finally.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, glancing down at Morley's feet, noticed what Bristow had seen
+three seconds after Morley had entered the room&mdash;his feet were large,
+abnormally large for a man of his build. He must have worn a number ten
+or, perhaps, a number eleven shoe.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought so," Bristow observed carelessly. "I sleep out on my sleeping
+porch at the back of the house here, and I knew it rained hard from early
+in the night until seven this morning."</p>
+
+<p>Morley, without commenting on this, looked at the two men.</p>
+
+<p>"Is there anything more?" he inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"No, nothing more; thanks," said Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>The young man went out quickly, slamming the door in his haste.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow answered Greenleaf's questioning look:</p>
+
+<p>"There was no use in our looking round the outside of the house for
+possible footprints this morning. If there had been any, the rain would
+have cleared them away. But, when I first ran up on the porch&mdash;it's
+roofed, like mine here&mdash;I noticed the dried marks made by a wet shoe
+hours before, a large shoe, by a large shoe with a rubber sole, or
+by a rubber shoe."</p>
+
+<p>"The devil you did!"</p>
+
+<p>"I did.&mdash;But it may turn out that Perry, or somebody else, or several
+other people, wore rubber shoes, or rubber-soled shoes last night.
+Negroes always have large feet."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I hope my man's found this Perry nigger," said the chief. "He's
+the fellow we want."</p>
+
+<p>"And yet," ruminated Bristow, "what young Morley said is interesting
+enough&mdash;two quarreling sisters living together&mdash;one decked in jewels, the
+other deprived of them&mdash;the jewels gone this morning." He smiled and
+waved his hands comprehensively. "As long as it <i>is</i> a mystery, let's
+have it a real mystery. Let's look at all sides of it. There's Perry.
+There's Morley. And&mdash;there's Miss Maria Fulton."</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;a possibility."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't connect her up with it any." The chief's voice was tinged
+with ridicule.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow answered a knock on the door and opened to admit a uniformed
+policeman.</p>
+
+<p>"Beg your pardon, chief," said the officer, "but I had something for a
+Mr. Morley. The men on guard down there at Number Five wouldn't let me
+in to see him&mdash;said I'd better see you."</p>
+
+<p>"What have you got, Avery?" asked Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"It's a little package. You know, I'm on that beat down there. Takes in
+the Brevord Hotel. The clerk said this Mr. Morley had sent his grips to
+the station, but had said he was coming up to Number Five, Manniston
+Road. He said there had been a murder up here. The clerk said he didn't
+know what to do with this property but turn it over to the police. As
+soon as I saw what it was, I hurried up here."</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's a ring, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"A ring!" exclaimed Bristow. "Let's see it."</p>
+
+<p>Policeman Avery handed Bristow a tissue paper package.</p>
+
+<p>The lame man unwound the paper and discovered a woman's ring, the setting
+a tremendous pigeon's-blood ruby flanked on each side by a diamond. It
+was an exceedingly handsome and very valuable piece of jewelry.</p>
+
+<p>"Where did the clerk get this?" Bristow asked swiftly.</p>
+
+<p>For the first time, he was visibly excited.</p>
+
+<p>"A maid found it under the bed on the floor of Mr. Morley's room at the
+Brevord," answered Avery.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf needed no hint from Bristow this time.</p>
+
+<p>"Avery," he said, "your beat takes in the railroad station. Go down to
+Number Five and get a good look at this man Morley. After that, if he
+attempts to leave Furmville, arrest him."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<h3>TWO TRAILS</h3>
+
+
+<p>"I'm afraid," said Bristow, after the policeman had hurried out, "we made
+a mistake in permitting Morley to talk to Miss Fulton just at present."</p>
+
+<p>"I can go down there and interrupt them," Greenleaf volunteered.</p>
+
+<p>The lame man reflected, a forefinger against the right side of his nose,
+the attitude emphasizing the fact that this feature was perceptibly
+crooked, bent toward the left.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he concluded. "We'd probably be too late." Then he added, "And we
+didn't find out Morley's employment or profession in Washington&mdash;but
+we can do that later."</p>
+
+<p>The chief of police prepared to leave, saying he was going to call at
+Douglas Campbell's office and from there go to headquarters in the hope
+that Perry had been found.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't you come with me?" he invited.</p>
+
+<p>"It's against the doctor's orders," Bristow replied. "He tells me not to
+leave this house or its porches. If I started to run around with you, I'd
+be exhausted in an hour. But I'll tell you what: this afternoon, after
+you've talked to Campbell and the darky, suppose you come back here, and
+we'll drop down to interview Miss Fulton ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>This surprised Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean you suspect&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," he countered lightly, "we've enough suspecting to do already.
+There's Perry&mdash;and there's Morley. Don't let's complicate it too much.
+But what Miss Fulton has to say may be valuable. By the way, if I should
+need to do so, how can I persuade anybody that I have authority to ask
+questions, or to do anything else in this matter?"</p>
+
+<p>The captain thought a moment.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll appoint you to the plain-clothes squad. I appoint you now, and the
+city commissioners will confirm it. They meet tonight. You're on the
+force&mdash;at a nominal salary&mdash;say ten dollars a week. That suit you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perfectly," consented Bristow. "What I want is the power to help in case
+I have the opportunity."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf went out to the porch, followed by Bristow, and started down
+the steps.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way," his new employee said in a cautious tone, "don't forget to
+stop at Number Five and look for those scratches, on the fingers and the
+neck."</p>
+
+<p>"By cracky!" exclaimed the chief. "I'd forgotten all about it. I'll do
+that right away."</p>
+
+<p>Looking toward No. 5, Bristow saw a hearse-like wagon drawing up in front
+of the door. The coroner had already made arrangements for the removal of
+the body of Mrs. Withers to an undertaking establishment.</p>
+
+<p>The lame man went slowly into the house and stood at the window, staring
+at the mountains. In the clear, newly washed air, they looked like the
+soft, tumbling waves of some magically blue sea.</p>
+
+<p>Like most retiring, secluded men, he had his vanity in pronounced degree.
+He saw himself now, the dominant figure in this city of thirty thousand
+people, the man who had been selected by the chief of police as the one
+able to unravel the web of mystery surrounding this startling murder. The
+thought pleased him, and he smiled. He began to think about himself and
+about life as a general proposition.</p>
+
+<p>Everything was always so mixed up, so involved. People talked of a divine
+providence, of the law that virtue is rewarded, of the rule that to do
+good is to have good done to one. He smiled again. If all that was true,
+what explanation was there for the murder of this woman, this beauty
+whose good nature, kindness, and cleverness had endeared her to all with
+whom she came in contact?</p>
+
+<p>He had heard the women on the porch of No. 5 say that everybody had loved
+her. Why, then, had some ignorant negro or some white man bent on robbery
+been permitted to steal up on her in the dead of night and crush out her
+life? Was there any reason, any logic, any mercy in that?</p>
+
+<p>He drummed on the window-pane with his fingertips and whistled, scarcely
+audibly, a fragment of tune. His pursed up mouth made it clear that he
+was not a handsome man&mdash;the lower lip was heavy, somewhat protuberant.</p>
+
+<p>Pshaw! There was only one rule of life that held good, so far as he had
+been able to see. Strength and persistence accomplished things and
+brought success and security. Weakness and foolish prating about
+righteousness and virtue were never worth a dollar.</p>
+
+<p>That was it! If you were mighty and clever, you stayed on top. If you
+were sentimental and looking after other people's interests, you went
+down. You had no time to bother about the safety and happiness of others.
+Look out for yourself. Never relent in the fierce battle against the odds
+of life. That was the only way to conquer and avoid catastrophe.</p>
+
+<p>He was sure of it when he thought about himself. He had a brilliant
+brain. It was not particularly egotistic for him to think that. It was
+merely a fact. But he had not used it relentlessly and incessantly.
+He had relaxed his hold too often when seeking pleasure. Although he had
+done things which had been applauded by his friends, he had nothing much
+to show in the way of lasting results.</p>
+
+<p>That was why he was here now, with scarcely enough resources to pay the
+rent of his bungalow and the expenses of living. A little dabbling in
+real estate, some third-rate work for the magazines, a passing notoriety
+as a guesser of crime riddles&mdash;it was not a record that promised a bright
+future.</p>
+
+<p>He sighed. Well, that was the way of life. He might yet accomplish big
+things although he was under a terrific handicap&mdash;and he might not. He
+would try, and see.</p>
+
+<p>His future was much like the probable outcome of this murder. How
+would the circumstances shape themselves? What would be the result of
+circumstantial evidence?</p>
+
+<p>It was all a gamble. Some murderers were lucky and got away. And some
+innocent men were not lucky. These were like the blundering, illiterate
+negro Perry. There was an even chance that the guilty man would be
+caught&mdash;and there was an even chance that an innocent man would hang.
+Life was like that!</p>
+
+<p>He caressed with his forefinger his protruding lip. He wouldn't say the
+negro was guilty. In spite of the evidence of the buttons, he would
+advance no such theory yet. And as to Morley&mdash;nobody could think that
+a man with such a weak face would have the nerve to do murder. He knew
+this. There must be somebody else. It might be that the sister, Maria
+Fulton, in an excess of rage&mdash;But why reason about that before he had
+talked to her?</p>
+
+<p>It was up to him to fasten the guilt on the guilty man&mdash;or woman. That
+was what was expected of him. And it was a task which&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>He turned toward the table and began methodically to paste into their
+proper places the clippings he had cut from the newspapers concerning
+other "big" murder cases. He would study them later.</p>
+
+<p>He looked up and saw a very fat man standing just outside the door.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Overton," he said, without cordiality, and joined him on the
+porch.</p>
+
+<p>"I picked out an interesting time to visit you," observed the fat man,
+still puffing from the exertion of climbing the Manniston Road hill;
+"what with murder and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And I'm going to be frank with you," Bristow put in. "I'm helping the
+police a little, and I haven't the time to gossip now. I know you'll
+understand&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Surely, surely!" said Overton. "I'll come some other time. This sort
+of stuff's right in your line. You used to be an authority on it in
+Cincinnati, I remember."</p>
+
+<p>He said good-bye and lumbered awkwardly down the steps. He and Bristow
+had been good friends in Cincinnati, and he seemed now not at all
+offended by the summary dismissal.</p>
+
+<p>The door leading from the kitchen to the dining room opened. Mattie had
+returned. Bristow reentered the house.</p>
+
+<p>"Well?" he said in the low, kindly tone he used in speaking to her.</p>
+
+<p>"I foun' Lucy Thomas, Mistuh Bristow," she said, breathless and
+indignant. "She is sho' one sorry nigger. She wuz drunk&mdash;layin' out in de
+parluh uv dat little house uv her'n. Dead drunk."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you wake her up, Mattie?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh; but she ain' fit to come do no wuk. Dis ole rotten blockade
+whisky dese niggers drink jes' knocked her out&mdash;knocked her out fuh
+fair."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she say when she got drunk?"</p>
+
+<p>"Las' night, suh, late, wid dat Perry. You know, Mistuh Bristow; he been
+doin' some wuk fuh you."</p>
+
+<p>"Was Perry drunk last night? Did she tell you?"</p>
+
+<p>"He wuz a little lit up, she says, but he warn't drunk. She didn't have
+no idea whar he wuz jes' now."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow made no comment on this, and Mattie, turning slowly away from
+him, began to mumble something.</p>
+
+<p>"What's that, Mattie?" he asked, only half curious.</p>
+
+<p>"I wuz jes' sayin', Mistuh Bristow, it 'pears to me marveelyus how some
+uv dese niggers behave. Dey don' look arter de white folks dey wuk fuh.
+Seems to me marveelyus how a lot uv dem keeps out uv jail."</p>
+
+<p>He was curious enough now.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?" he asked sharply. "What are you talking about?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's jes' dis, suh: when I gits ovuh to Lucy's house, de fus' thing I
+sees is a key layin' on de flo'. When I ast her 'bout it, she says it
+mus' be de key to Number Five&mdash;she mus' uv drapped it."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," said Bristow thoughtfully. "Yes, you're right, Mattie. There are
+a lot of careless people in the world."</p>
+
+<p>When she had gone back to the kitchen, the full force of what she had
+said struck him. How simple it would have been for Perry to have taken
+the key from the drunken Lucy and gone to No. 5! After the commission of
+the crime, what would have been easier than for him to throw the key on
+the floor in Lucy's house, thus apparently proving that he had had no way
+of gaining entrance to the bungalow?</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't foresee this," he meditated. "There's only one thing more
+needed to hang that darky. That is the discovery that he has in his
+possession, or has hidden, the jewelry."</p>
+
+<p>He seemed suddenly reminded of something else by this thought. He went to
+the telephone and called up the Brevord Hotel.</p>
+
+<p>"A Mr. Morley, Mr. Henry Morley, registered there last night, didn't he?"
+he inquired of the clerk.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," the clerk replied.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder," continued Bristow suavely, "if you'd mind looking at the
+register and telling me exactly at what time he did register. This is
+Chief Greenleaf's office talking."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Yes, sir; very glad to. Just hold the wire a moment while I
+look."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow waited. The Brevord was scarcely four minutes' walk from the
+railroad station. Morley, having missed the midnight train by two
+minutes, should have registered at the hotel certainly not later than ten
+minutes past midnight.</p>
+
+<p>"I have it," came the clerk's voice. "Mr. Henry Morley, of Washington, D.
+C., registered here at five minutes past two this morning."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was astonished, but his voice was uncoloured by surprise when he
+inquired:</p>
+
+<p>"Are you sure of that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite," said the clerk laconically. "We always put down opposite each
+guest's name the time of arrival and registering."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks ever so much." Bristow hung up the receiver slowly.</p>
+
+<p>It was now after one o'clock, and, following the routine prescribed by
+his doctor, he made his way to the sleeping porch to lie down for half an
+hour before dinner, his midday meal.</p>
+
+<p>"From midnight until two o'clock this morning," he reflected, revolving a
+dozen different facts in his mind. "Mr. Morley failed to mention how he
+amused himself during all that time. If he's not a criminal, he's
+criminally stupid."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2>
+
+<h3>THE HUSBAND'S STORY</h3>
+
+
+<p>Mr. Bristow, however, was not allowed to rest half an hour. Instead, he
+was called upon to consider a phase of the Withers murder more amazing
+than any of those so far uncovered. Barely ten minutes after his
+conversation with the clerk of the Brevord, Mattie announced that two
+gentlemen were waiting to see him, one of them being the chief of police.</p>
+
+<p>When Bristow stepped into the living room, Greenleaf introduced the
+stranger. He was Mr. Withers&mdash;Mr. George S. Withers, husband of the
+murdered woman. He was of the extreme brunette type, his hair
+blue-black, his black eyes keen and piercing and always on the move.
+Bristow got the impression in looking at him that all his features,
+the aquiline nose, the firm, compressed mouth, the large ears, were
+remarkably sharp-cut.</p>
+
+<p>The man's excitement was almost beyond his control. He apparently made no
+attempt to hide the fact that his hands trembled like leaves in the wind
+and that, every now and then, his legs quivered perceptibly. As soon as
+he had shaken hands, he sank into a chair.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Withers," the chief explained, "caught me at Number Five before I
+had started down town. I have explained how you are helping me in
+this&mdash;er distressing matter. So we came up here."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," said Bristow, betraying no surprise that Withers had appeared so
+suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>In fact, he had not thought of the husband previously, except to
+calculate that, in answer to the telegram Dr. Braley had undoubtedly
+sent, he could not reach Furmville from Atlanta before far into the
+night.</p>
+
+<p>"He only heard of the tragedy half an hour ago," Greenleaf added.</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't know you were in town or even expected," Bristow said casually.
+"I thought you were in Atlanta."</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;I wasn't expected." Withers hurried his words.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean nobody expected you?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's it, I wasn't expected. But I've been in&mdash;in town here since
+yesterday morning."</p>
+
+<p>"And Mrs. Withers didn't know of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody knew of it. I didn't want anybody to know of it."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow purposely remained silent, awaiting some explanation. He looked
+down, studying the pattern of the scratches he made by rubbing his right
+shoe against the side of the built-up sole, two inches thick, of his left
+shoe. The shortness of his crippled leg made this heavy sole necessary;
+and the awkwardness of it worried him. He seemed always conscious of it.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, taking his cue from Bristow, said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"I came in without notifying anybody," Withers felt himself obliged to
+continue, "and I registered under an assumed name."</p>
+
+<p>"Where?" the lame man asked swiftly.</p>
+
+<p>"At the Brevord."</p>
+
+<p>"What name&mdash;under what name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Waring, Charles B. Waring."</p>
+
+<p>"And you've been in Furmville since yesterday morning? Got here on the
+eight o'clock train yesterday morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow gave him the benefit of another long pause and studied him more
+closely. He saw that this bereaved husband was of the high-strung,
+Southern-gentleman type, hot-tempered, impulsive, one of those apt to
+believe that "shooting" is the remedy for one's personal ills or
+injuries. The lines of his mouth betrayed selfishness and peevishness.</p>
+
+<p>The interrogator broke the silence at last:</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, Mr. Withers, there's some good explanation
+for your secret trip to Furmville?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;er&mdash;yes."</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>Withers hesitated.</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;I don't know that I care to say now&mdash;to discuss it yet."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow shot Greenleaf a prompting glance.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, it's this way," the chief acted on the silent suggestion; "I'm
+in charge of this matter, the capture of the murderer, and Mr. Bristow is
+helping me. In fact, he's the man in command. His abilities fit him for
+the work. If the man who killed your wife is caught, it will be through
+the work of Mr. Bristow. I'm confident of that. Moreover, every minute we
+lose now may be disastrous to us. Consequently, we want to hear your
+story. You appreciate our position, I know."</p>
+
+<p>Withers licked his dry lips with the tip of his dry tongue.</p>
+
+<p>"How about the newspapers?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"You'll be talking only for our information," cut in Bristow crisply. "We
+won't give it to the papers. We want to use it for our own benefit."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, I see. Well, then&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Withers got up and paced the length of the floor several times in silence
+while they watched him. He gave the impression of framing up in advance
+in his mind what he would say. He seemed to want to talk without talking
+too much&mdash;to tell a part of a story, not all.</p>
+
+<p>"I tell you, gentlemen," he said, going back to his chair, his voice
+trembling, "this is a hard thing to get to. I mean I don't like to say
+what I must say. But I see there's no way out but this. The truth of the
+matter is, I came up here to satisfy myself as to what my wife was doing
+in regard to a certain matter."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean you were suspicious of her&mdash;jealous of her?" Bristow
+interpolated.</p>
+
+<p>"No, not that," returned the husband.</p>
+
+<p>"He's lying!" was the thought of both Greenleaf and Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"No. Let me make that very clear. I never doubted her in that way."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, how did you doubt her?"</p>
+
+<p>Withers winced.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't mean I doubted her at all. I mean I thought she was being
+imposed upon financially. In fact, I was sure of it. I'm sure of it now."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean blackmail?" Bristow narrowed down the inquiry.</p>
+
+<p>"Just that. And I'll tell you about it." He rasped his dry lips again.
+"This sort of thing, this blackmail, had happened to her twice before
+this. Once it was when she was at Atlantic City for a month with her
+sister, Miss Maria Fulton.</p>
+
+<p>"That was a year after our marriage. Then, two years later&mdash;just about a
+year ago now&mdash;when she was in Washington visiting her father and sister.
+Both those times things happened as they had begun to happen here, in
+fact as they've been happening here for the past two months."</p>
+
+<p>"Well," Bristow urged him on, "what happened?"</p>
+
+<p>"She got away with too much money, more money than she could possibly
+have used for herself in any legitimate way. First, she got her father to
+give her all she could get out of him. Her second step would be to write
+to me for all I could spare, making flimsy excuses for her need of it.</p>
+
+<p>"Her third resource was to pawn all her jewels. She pawned them on these
+first two occasions I've described. I say she pawned them, but I never
+had definite proof of it. However, I was sure of it. I don't know that
+she had come to this in Furmville. If she hadn't she would have."</p>
+
+<p>"What were Mrs. Withers' jewels worth?"</p>
+
+<p>"Originally, I should say, they cost about fifteen thousand dollars. She
+had no difficulty, I suppose, in raising six or seven thousand dollars on
+them&mdash;even more than that."</p>
+
+<p>"They were worth so much as all that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Her father had given her most of them before his business failure.
+He failed last fall, I forgot to mention."</p>
+
+<p>"Now," Bristow said persuasively, "about this blackmailing proposition.
+What was&mdash;what is your idea about that?"</p>
+
+<p>Withers produced and lit a cigarette, handling it with quivering fingers.</p>
+
+<p>"Somebody, some man, had a hold of some sort on her. Whenever he needed
+money, had to have money, he got it from her. That is, he did this
+whenever he could find her away from home. So far as I know, he never
+tried to operate in Atlanta."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think this hold was?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well," Withers began, and paused.</p>
+
+<p>"Your theories are perfectly safe with us," Bristow reassured him.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought, naturally, that it had something to do with her life previous
+to the time I met her."</p>
+
+<p>"How?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't know. That's what worried me." All of a sudden, his hearers got
+a clear idea of what the man had suffered. It was plainly to be detected
+in his voice. "It might have been a harmless love affair, a flirtation,
+with letters involved, letters which she thought would distress me if I
+ever saw them."</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing more than that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I never thought she had been guilty of anything&mdash;well, immoral,
+heinous."</p>
+
+<p>"You say," Bristow changed the course of questioning, "she pawned her
+jewels twice. How did she do that? Where did she get the money to redeem
+them after the first pawning?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I never could find out."</p>
+
+<p>"You had no six or seven thousand dollars to give her for that purpose,
+as I understand it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"Where did she get it, then?" Bristow's questions, despite their
+directness, were free from offense.</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;I thought," Withers began again and paused. "I thought that, perhaps,
+her father helped her out, got the jewels out of pawn both times for
+her."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you ever ask him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; and he denied having done so. But, you see, my theory is borne out.
+Before, when she pawned them, her father was wealthy; and she was his
+favourite child. She knew he would help her. But now his money is gone.
+He's failed. Consequently, she has not pawned them this time. She knew
+there would be no chance to redeem them."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow leaned forward in his chair.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Withers," he asked, "as a matter of fact, did you ever know that
+your wife had pawned her jewels?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well," he said, as if making an admission, "she would never confess it
+to me. I assumed it from the fact that on both occasions the jewels were
+missing for a good while. They were certainly not in her possession. She
+couldn't produce them when called upon to do so."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Now, Mr. Withers, what did you do yesterday, all day yesterday,
+after reaching here?"</p>
+
+<p>"I went to the Brevord and registered under the name of Waring. After I
+had had breakfast, I went straight to Abrahamson's pawnshop. It's the
+only pawnshop in town. I told him I was looking for some stolen jewelry
+and I expected that an attempt might be made to pawn it with him. He
+agreed to let me wait there, well concealed by the heavy hangings at the
+back of his shop. I spent the day there except for a few minutes in the
+afternoon when I went out for a quick lunch."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes? Did you find out anything?"</p>
+
+<p>Once more Withers found it hard to speak.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes"; he said finally. "A man came in and pawned one of my wife's rings.
+It had a setting of three diamonds. It was worth about seven hundred and
+fifty dollars, I should say. Abrahamson let him have only a hundred on
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"Why only a hundred?"</p>
+
+<p>"I had asked him to do that, so as to prove that the man was a thief&mdash;you
+know, willing to take anything offered to him."</p>
+
+<p>"And he did take the hundred?"</p>
+
+<p>"He did."</p>
+
+<p>"What happened after that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I followed him from the shop&mdash;for half a block. When he had gone that
+distance, I lost him. He stepped into a store, and I waited for him to
+come out. He never did. It was the old dodge. The store extended the
+width of a block. He made his escape through the other entrance."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf was more excited even than Withers.</p>
+
+<p>"This man," the chief put in; "what did he look like?"</p>
+
+<p>"He was of average weight, medium height. He had a gold tooth, the upper
+left bicuspid gold. His nose was aquiline. He wore a long, dark gray
+raincoat, and he had a cap with its long visor pulled well over his face.
+Then, too, he wore a beard, chestnut-brown in colour. That's about the
+best description I can give you of him. You see, this happened late in
+the afternoon."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," Bristow kept to the main thread of the story. "Now, about
+last night. What then?"</p>
+
+<p>Withers threw away his cigarette and sighed.</p>
+
+<p>"I came up here and watched Number Five. I had an idea that this fellow
+might show up."</p>
+
+<p>"Did he?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you watch from?"</p>
+
+<p>"Most of the time I sat on the steps of Number Four, almost directly
+across the road from Number Five. You know how it is on this street.
+Nearly everybody is in the back of the house after dark. The invalids are
+on the sleeping porches behind the houses. Besides, it was in deep shadow
+where I was. I was not observed when my&mdash;when Mrs. Withers left the house
+with an escort, a man, early in the evening."</p>
+
+<p>"And you waited until she returned?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I waited."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well." There was for the first time a hint of sharpness in
+Bristow's voice. "You waited. What did you see?"</p>
+
+<p>For the past few minutes a change had been taking place in the bearing of
+Withers. It was as if, having recovered slightly from the terrific shock
+of his wife's death, he was gradually stiffening, gaining the strength
+necessary to withstand the swift volley of Bristow's questions.</p>
+
+<p>The questioner, sensing this alteration in the other, made his queries
+all the quicker and more peremptory. He wanted to profit as much as
+possible from the other's lack of control.</p>
+
+<p>"I saw her return with her escort," Withers answered. "She shook hands
+with him and went into the house and closed the door. He got into his
+machine, turned it and went back toward town."</p>
+
+<p>"Was his machine noisy?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you try to enter Number Five?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I wasn't ready to disclose my presence. I wanted more time."</p>
+
+<p>He put his hand to his watch pocket and was surprised to find that no
+watch was there; he had been making nervous little movements like that
+throughout the interview; but he kept his keen glance on his questioner.</p>
+
+<p>"Then, tell us this, please," Bristow demanded, the sharpness in his tone
+pronounced: "have you and your wife been on the best of terms lately?
+And another thing: have you ever had any lasting, distressing
+disagreements with her?"</p>
+
+<p>The effect of this upon Withers was entirely surprising. He sprang from
+his chair, his features suddenly working with rage.</p>
+
+<p>"Dammit!" he exclaimed in a tense, vibrant voice, as his glance rested
+first on Bristow and then on Greenleaf. "What does all this amount to
+anyway? Here you are, asking me questions as if you thought I had killed
+my own wife! What I want is results, not a lot of hot air and bluff!"</p>
+
+<p>He snapped his fingers under Bristow's nose.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, dammit!" he shrilled. "Haven't you any idea yet where to look for
+the murderer? Are you groping around here helplessly after all this time?
+Dammit! I want a real detective on this job, and I'm going to get one."</p>
+
+<p>He clapped his felt hat to his head and started toward the door.</p>
+
+<p>"You can bet your last dollar on that! I'm going to get one, and he'll be
+here tomorrow if telegrams can bring him. I'll have Sam Braceway, the
+cleverest fellow in this business in the South, here tomorrow! I intend
+to have punishment for the devil who killed my wife. Punishment!&mdash;the
+worst kind!"</p>
+
+<p>His lips were trembling, and he dashed the back of his hand across his
+face, as if he feared the formation of tears in his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"You two boneheads can put that in your pipes and smoke it! I mean
+business!"</p>
+
+<p>He slammed the door, and was gone, taking the steps to the street in two
+bounds.</p>
+
+<p>"By cracky!" said Greenleaf. "What do you make of that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing," Bristow answered contemptuously; "nothing except that it may
+be well for us to find out a whole lot more about Mr. Withers and his
+peculiarities of temper and temperament."</p>
+
+<p>"I should say so," the chief chimed agreement.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," Bristow added, "that was the easiest way for him to break
+off our inquiry. I don't think he was on the level with all that storming
+and raging. It might have been just a great big bluff&mdash;that's all. And
+yet, that Braceway he talked about is good, a wonder. He's done some
+wonderful work."</p>
+
+<p>"Here's one point," Greenleaf advanced: "why didn't he ask for help from
+the police yesterday afternoon when he lost track of that fellow with the
+gold tooth?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," the other returned absent-mindedly; "why didn't he?"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+
+<h3>MORLEY IS IN A HURRY</h3>
+
+
+<p>Bristow looked at his watch. It was nearly half-past two o'clock.</p>
+
+<p>"Hear anything about Perry?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Greenleaf informed him. "My man found him. They've got him down at
+headquarters. I phoned from Number Five and got this. He'd been drinking.
+I gather that he's about half-drunk now."</p>
+
+<p>"Good! If he'll talk at all, it will be easier for you to get the truth
+out of him that way than if he were cold sober. Suppose you see him and
+Douglas Campbell; and later on this afternoon you and I can talk to Miss
+Fulton and her father."</p>
+
+<p>"Her father won't be here today. He wired that a little while ago. He'll
+get here early in the morning."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well. It's of no consequence just now. Come back here for me at
+four, will you?"</p>
+
+<p>When the chief had gone, Bristow sat down to his delayed dinner. As he
+ate, he went over the facts so far discovered, and catalogued them:</p>
+
+<p>Perry, the negro&mdash;incriminated, probably, by the buttons from his
+overalls jacket; by the ease with which he could have obtained from Lucy
+Thomas the kitchen key to No. 5; by the possible motive of robbery; and
+by the brutal means, choking, employed to inflict death.</p>
+
+<p>Morley&mdash;incriminated by his unknown whereabouts during the two hours
+following his missing the midnight train, and by the discovery of the
+ring (possibly Mrs. Withers') in his room at the Brevord.</p>
+
+<p>Withers&mdash;involved by the probable motive of jealousy and rage, and by his
+secret trip to Furmville.</p>
+
+<p>Maria Fulton&mdash;well, he would see.</p>
+
+<p>"Just now," he concluded in his own mind, "it looks worse for the negro
+than anybody else. There's one thing certain: the man against whom the
+most evidence rests by the time they have the inquest tomorrow will be
+the one held for the action of the grand jury. That's the thing to
+do&mdash;get the one who seems most probably guilty."</p>
+
+<p>He thought of Douglas Campbell and immediately dismissed him as a
+possibility in the list of probable murderers. The young real estate
+dealer had been completely exonerated by the statement of the dead
+woman's husband; that, upon bringing her back to the bungalow, he had at
+once said good night to her and gone home.</p>
+
+<p>Nor did he puzzle his mind about the unknown individual with the gold
+tooth, he who had appeared in Abrahamson's pawnshop and a few minutes
+later miraculously disappeared. If the ring pawned had belonged to Mrs.
+Withers, why should this man return to No. 5 and murder her? If he had
+obtained nothing from her beforehand, he might have had a real motive for
+the crime. But, since he had already got the ring, it seemed folly to
+assume that he would later kill her.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of his growing belief that the onus of proof must fall upon the
+negro, Bristow could not keep his thoughts away from young Morley. He,
+more than any of the other suspects, had told an unsatisfactory story.
+Besides, he had a bad face.</p>
+
+<p>The latest addition to the Furmville plain-clothes squad remembered how
+carefully Morley's hands had been manicured. He&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>With a quick motion, he went to the telephone and called for Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"Chief, are you still holding Perry?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, I'm holding him. I'll continue to hold him for some time, I'm
+thinking. His story don't suit me. He says&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"All right. Ill get that from you when I see you this afternoon. In the
+meantime, I wish you'd have his finger nails carefully cleaned. I
+want&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>But the request had instantly overwhelmed Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"What!" he yelled. "Clean his finger nails!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Bristow continued smoothly, disregarding the other's evident
+distaste and surprise. "If I were down there, I'd do it myself. In fact,
+it would be better for you to do it. Don't leave it to some careless
+subordinate."</p>
+
+<p>The chief laughed his sarcasm.</p>
+
+<p>"You know," this still with laughter, "we Southerners are none too strong
+on acting as manicures to these coloured folks."</p>
+
+<p>"It's absolutely necessary," was the insistent answer. "And, when you do
+clean them, save every bit of dirt thus obtained. Now, will you do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes," Greenleaf assented with reluctance. "If you say it's
+absolutely necessary, I'll do it&mdash;I'll do it myself."</p>
+
+<p>"Good. I'll depend on you for it. By the way, can't you have somebody,
+your man Jenkins or some one as good as he is, go out on a real hunt for
+the fellow with the gold tooth? You remember Withers' description of
+him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I'd thought of that."</p>
+
+<p>"That's good. If he can't spot him at any of the hotels, have him make
+the rounds of the boarding houses. I think you'd like to get your hands
+on a customer as slippery as Withers says that man is."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll send Jenkins at once," the chief took his directions in good part.</p>
+
+<p>"Good again. By the way, you'll be up here at four?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; five. Dr. Braley told me we'd have to wait until then; said we'd
+better. He wants her to get that extra hour's sleep."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow started to say something further, hesitated and then hung up the
+receiver with a word of assent.</p>
+
+<p>Mattie had come in to clear off the table.</p>
+
+<p>"Go down to Number Six," he told her, "and ask Mrs. Allen if she will be
+so kind as to come up here at her earliest convenience. Explain to her
+that it's against the doctor's orders for me to leave this house, and
+that the excitement of this morning has tired me out."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Allen appeared in less than a quarter of an hour. He received her in
+the living room and introduced himself, apologizing for not having been
+able to call on her. She understood perfectly, she said.</p>
+
+<p>She was a woman about forty years of age, her face a little thin and
+worn, a good deal of gray in her dark hair. She had been nursing her
+husband for two years, and the strain had begun to tell. Nevertheless,
+he soon saw that she was a woman of refinement, possessed of a keen
+intelligence.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish," he requested, after he had explained his connection with the
+murder, "you'd tell me all you know about these sisters. I gathered this
+morning that you were well acquainted with them."</p>
+
+<p>He had always found it easy to gain the confidence of women. They liked
+his manners, his air of deference, his manifest interest in everything
+they said.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't say that I've been intimate with them," Mrs. Allen explained in
+her soft, pleasing voice; "but Mrs. Withers and I knew each other pretty
+well. She came over to my house quite frequently, and I was in the habit
+of running in to see her."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you know the other, Miss Fulton, equally well?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. You see, she was always in, or on, the bed, and she never seemed to
+want to talk. Besides, she was different from Mrs. Withers&mdash;not so bright
+and attractive, and not so neighbourly."</p>
+
+<p>"Mrs. Withers was always a laughing, sparkling sort of a person, wasn't
+she?"</p>
+
+<p>"She gave that impression to some people," Mrs. Allen answered
+thoughtfully, "but not to me. It was her nature to be free and happy.
+Most of the time she seemed that way. But there were other times when
+I could see that she had something weighing on her mind, something
+depressing her."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah!" Bristow said with deeper interest. "That's just what we want to
+find out about."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Allen sat silent for a moment pursing her lips.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow let her reflect.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think," she said at last, "Mrs. Withers ever was in fear of
+anybody or any thing. She wasn't that kind."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she ever tell you anything to make you think that she wasn't happy?"</p>
+
+<p>"I was trying to recall just what it was. Once, I remember, when she was
+sitting out on the sleeping porch&mdash;she sometimes came out there to talk
+to my husband, who is always in bed&mdash;we had been discussing the care with
+which every woman had to live her life.</p>
+
+<p>"'Women are like politicians,' Mr. Allen said. 'They can't afford to have
+a dark spot in their past. If they do, somebody will drag it out.'</p>
+
+<p>"At that Mrs. Withers cried out:</p>
+
+<p>"'Oh! how awfully true that is! And how unfair! It never seems to matter
+with men, but with women it means heaven, or the other thing. I wish
+I knew&mdash;&mdash;' She broke off with a gasp, and I saw her lip tremble.</p>
+
+<p>"It was funny, but at the time I thought she was referring to her sister,
+not to herself."</p>
+
+<p>"What made you think that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I had no real reason for it. Perhaps it was just because
+unhappiness seemed so foreign to Mrs. Withers herself."</p>
+
+<p>"Was there anything else?"</p>
+
+<p>"Once, when I ran into Number Five, I found her crying. She was in the
+living room, all doubled up in a rocking chair, crying silently."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she say why?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; but, while I was trying to soothe her, she said, 'Life's so
+hard&mdash;it's so hard to straighten out a tangle when once you've made it.
+If one could just go back and do things over again!' When I asked her if
+I could help her, she said I couldn't. 'Nobody can,' she sobbed out on my
+shoulder. 'It doesn't concern me alone. I'll have to fight it out the
+best way I can.'"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was greatly interested.</p>
+
+<p>"What did you conclude from all that, Mrs. Allen?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"My impression was very vague," Mrs. Allen returned frankly. "I don't
+think it is of much value now. I got, somehow, the idea that there was in
+her life something which she had to conceal, something which might at any
+moment be discovered. I thought she was worrying about its effect on her
+husband. Of course, though, that was just my idea."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Now, just one other thing: what did you think, what do you think,
+of Miss Fulton?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, merely that she's bad-tempered and impatient, always complaining.
+She was totally without any appreciation of all that Mrs. Withers did
+for her. Nobody likes Miss Fulton particularly. I think all of us, as we
+came to know the two, were amazed that Mrs. Withers could have such a
+disagreeable sister."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Allen's recital, while interesting and valuable as to Mrs. Withers'
+acknowledgment that she felt compelled to keep secret some part of her
+life, threw no practical light on the situation.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was silent, thoughtful, for a few moments.</p>
+
+<p>"I've never seen Miss Fulton, except for the glance I had at her this
+morning," he said. "Was it possible for anybody to mistake one for the
+other? I mean this: if a man had known that last night Miss Fulton was up
+and dressed, could it have been possible for him, in a dim light and
+under the stress of terrific agitation, to have attacked Mrs. Withers
+under the impression that he was attacking Miss Fulton?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no!" Mrs. Allen said emphatically, and then added: "Oh, I see what
+you mean. Well, they were of about the same build, although Mrs. Withers
+wasn't so thin as Miss Fulton is. Then, their hair is different, Mrs.
+Withers' black, Miss Fulton's blond. I don't know. I should say it all
+depended on how dark it was."</p>
+
+<p>When Mrs. Allen had gone, Bristow took from a bookcase one of his
+scrapbooks and went to work pasting into place the clippings he had been
+reading that morning when interrupted by the cry of murder.</p>
+
+<p>For nine years he had been studying murder cases and the methods of
+murderers. People had laughed at his fad, but now he was more pleased
+with himself as a result of it than ever before. He was still pleasantly
+aware of the prominence he would enjoy in Furmville because of
+Greenleaf's having called on him for assistance.</p>
+
+<p>"Every murderer," he had said many times, "makes some mistake, big or
+little, which will lead to his destruction if the authorities have brains
+enough to find it."</p>
+
+<p>He thought the rule might apply too widely to this case. In fact, his own
+trouble now was that too many mistakes had been made, too many clues had
+been left lying around. In order to determine the guilty person, much
+chaff would have to be sifted from the wheat of truth.</p>
+
+<p>He was closing his scrapbook when the chief of police arrived a few
+minutes before five o'clock.</p>
+
+<p>"Henry Morley," Greenleaf announced at once, "is a receiving teller in a
+bank in Washington&mdash;the Anderson National Bank."</p>
+
+<p>"And receiving tellers," put in Bristow quickly, "sometimes need
+money&mdash;need it to make good other money they have 'borrowed' from the
+bank. How did you find this out?"</p>
+
+<p>"He told me when I met him at Number Five after leaving you this
+afternoon."</p>
+
+<p>"Was he still there then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. It seems that Miss Fulton refused at first to see him. When she did
+see him, it was for only a minute or two. He was very much agitated when
+he came from her room."</p>
+
+<p>"There's another thing," added Bristow. "Morley has two hours of last
+night to account for. He told us he missed the midnight train and went to
+the Brevord to spend the night. As a matter of fact, he registered at the
+Brevord a little after two o'clock this morning."</p>
+
+<p>The chief's jaw dropped.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you know that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I called up the Brevord and got the information from the clerk."</p>
+
+<p>"That settles it, then," Greenleaf said, his jaw set. "That young man
+will have to remain with us for a while."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; quite properly."</p>
+
+<p>"I guess it's time for us to move." The chief turned toward the door.</p>
+
+<p>"One moment," said the other. "Somehow, I have the impression that we may
+get important stuff from Maria Fulton. She may not give it to us directly
+and willingly, but we may get it all the same. And I was thinking this:
+you and I have got to keep our heads. We don't want to get rattled with
+the idea that we're up against an unsolvable mystery.</p>
+
+<p>"As you know, I've lived in New York and Chicago and Cincinnati. For the
+past eight or nine years I've gotten a lot of fun out of watching and
+studying these cases. And the thing I've learned above all others is that
+the best way for a criminal to escape is for the authorities to lose
+their heads and think they are up against something that's really much
+bigger than it is.</p>
+
+<p>"You see what I mean? What we want to do is to go ahead with our eyes
+open, knowing that at any moment we may stumble against the one act that
+will make everything clear and definite."</p>
+
+<p>"That's good talk, and I'll try to act on it," replied the chief, "but,
+gee whiz! I'm not used to stuff of this sort. It kinder makes me sick."</p>
+
+<p>They went out to the porch.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way," Bristow asked, "what about the two buttons we found?"</p>
+
+<p>"They belonged to Perry," Greenleaf answered. "There's no getting around
+that. He had the two middle buttons of his overalls jacket missing.
+What's more, one of the buttons, the one that had a little piece of the
+cloth clinging to it, fitted exactly into the hole made in the jacket
+when the button was pulled out."</p>
+
+<p>"Which button was that?"</p>
+
+<p>"The first one&mdash;the one you found in Number Five."</p>
+
+<p>They started down the steps.</p>
+
+<p>"You saw the scratches on Mrs. Withers' hand, didn't you?" said Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, if Perry did the scratching, we can prove it. Any good laboratory
+man can tell us whether the stuff that was under his nails contains
+particles of the human skin, the epidermis. If those particles are found,
+the case is settled, it seems to me."</p>
+
+<p>"By cracky!" exclaimed Greenleaf, his admiration of his assistant
+growing. "You've solved the problem&mdash;gone to the very bottom of it."</p>
+
+<p>"What did Perry have to say? What was his story?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it amounted to nothing. Said he wasn't near Number Five; said he was
+drunk last night and thought he was at the house of this Lucy Thomas all
+the time."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, the proof rests upon what the laboratory analysis of the finger
+nail stuff shows. When can we get that report?"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was a little surprised by the embarrassment Greenleaf showed
+before answering:</p>
+
+<p>"We can get it tomorrow&mdash;by wire."</p>
+
+<p>"Why can't we get it tonight&mdash;or tomorrow at the latest? The Davis
+laboratory here can do the work. It does laboratory work for all these
+doctors here."</p>
+
+<p>"It can't do any work for me," objected Greenleaf stubbornly. "Dr. Davis
+and I aren't on speaking terms, personally or politically. I'll send the
+stuff down to a laboratory at Charlotte. It will reach there tomorrow
+morning if I get it off on the midnight train. We can get the telegraphed
+report on it late tomorrow or the day after."</p>
+
+<p>"All right; I guess that will do," agreed Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>As they started up the steps to the Fulton bungalow, Morley came out to
+the porch and charged down toward them. His face was convulsed as if by
+anger or fear. He did not seem to see the two men. Bristow caught him by
+the arm and put the query:</p>
+
+<p>"Where are you going, Mr. Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley shook off his hand and answered curtly:</p>
+
+<p>"To Washington. I've barely got time to catch my train."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't hurry," Bristow said with a touch of sarcasm. "You're too good at
+missing trains anyway. Besides, we want to know what you did between
+midnight and two-ten this morning, and why you failed to tell us this
+morning that you didn't register at the Brevord until after two."</p>
+
+<p>Morley's face went white.</p>
+
+<p>"There wasn't anything to that," he explained. "I didn't mean to conceal
+anything. I didn't go anywhere&mdash;anywhere specially."</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you go?" insisted Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"I took a walk. That was all. I didn't feel like sleeping."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you see anybody while you were walking?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not that I remember. Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because, if you did, it might be advisable for you to remember. It may
+become necessary for you to prove an alibi."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that!" the young man said with a nervous laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Can't you tell us where you went?"</p>
+
+<p>"I wandered around, up and down the down-town streets. That was all."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, remember," Bristow cautioned him. "If you can produce two or three
+people who saw you down there, it may help you a whole lot."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that's all right, I haven't done anything against the law. The
+idea's absurd."</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Bristow's right," Greenleaf put in. "We'll have to know more about
+how you spent those two hours. Really, we will. If you try to leave town,
+you'll be arrested. My men have their orders."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf had forgotten about the ring found in the young man's hotel
+room, but Bristow hadn't.</p>
+
+<p>Morley went slowly down Manniston Road. There was a cold moisture upon
+his forehead.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+
+<h3>MISS FULTON IS HYSTERICAL</h3>
+
+
+<p>The chief and his assistant were received by Miss Kelly, the trained
+nurse. Bristow wasted no time in what he considered to be the crucial
+search for more evidence. In speaking to her he exercised all his
+persuasiveness, all the suggestion of power and authority that he could
+force into his voice and expression. And yet, he gave her, as he had
+given Mrs. Allen, the impression that he deferred to her and prized her
+opinions.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't there something you can tell us?" he asked, holding her glance
+with his own.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>She was a strong, capable-looking woman of twenty-six years or so.</p>
+
+<p>"Like every good citizen," he answered smoothly, "you want exactly what
+we want, a clearing up of all this muddle. I thought, perhaps, there
+might be something you'd heard or seen. Isn't there?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; nothing, sir," she returned, true to her professional teaching that
+a nurse is forbidden to reveal the secrets of the sickroom.</p>
+
+<p>"You'll be called as a witness at the inquest," he hazarded, and was
+rewarded by a look of uncertainty in her eyes. "Your duty to the law is
+above everything else," he added.</p>
+
+<p>"I've heard Miss Fulton say only one thing," she admitted reluctantly.
+"She's said it several times while under the influence of the sedatives
+she's had."</p>
+
+<p>"What was it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing that made any sense. It was, 'When he&mdash;say&mdash;I&mdash;asleep.' There
+were long pauses between each of the words. She said it four or five
+times. But she hasn't said anything since she waked up."</p>
+
+<p>"How long has she been awake?"</p>
+
+<p>"About fifteen minutes. Mr. Morley saw her five minutes ago, but he
+wasn't in there more than a minute or two."</p>
+
+<p>"Morley's seen her a second time!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; but each time she hasn't wanted to talk to him. The truth is, she
+drove him out of the room."</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't hear what they said?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Kelly drew herself up indignantly.</p>
+
+<p>"I wasn't in the room," she said coldly. "Of course, I didn't hear."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow apologized for the implication that she had overheard
+intentionally.</p>
+
+<p>When he and Greenleaf were shown into Miss Fulton's room, he had made up
+his mind in lightning-like manner that what she had said in her delirium,
+meant: "When he (her father or the police) asks me about last night, I
+shall say I was asleep all night." It came to him like an intuition,
+without his even trying to reason it out; and he decided to act on it.</p>
+
+<p>They found Maria Fulton propped up against pillows in the bed. Although
+her pupils were still enlarged by the sedatives she had had, she was
+plainly labouring under the stress of great emotion.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was pleased by that. It would make it easier to learn what she
+knew. It is difficult, he reflected, for a person under the partial
+effects of a drug to lie intelligently or convincingly.</p>
+
+<p>He and Greenleaf, taking the chairs that had been placed near the bed by
+Miss Kelly, regretted the necessity of their intrusion.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it's all right," Miss Fulton said petulantly. "I know it's
+essential. Dr. Braley told me so."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow studied her intently. He saw that Mrs. Allen had been right.
+Maria Fulton was a dissatisfied, peevish woman. She had the heavy,
+slightly pendent lower lip that goes with much pouting. There was the
+constant trace of a frown between her eyebrows, and in the eyes
+themselves was the look of complaint and protest which the "martyr-type"
+woman always shows.</p>
+
+<p>She was of the infantile, spoiled class, he decided, one who, remembering
+that her childhood tears and fits of temper had always resulted in her
+getting what she wanted, had brought the habit into her adult years. He
+noted, too, that her gorgeous ash-blond hair had been carefully "done,"
+piled in high masses above her petulant face.</p>
+
+<p>"There are just a few questions which we thought it imperative to ask
+you," he said, trying to convey to her his desire to be as considerate as
+possible. "We shall make them as brief as we can."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Fulton plucked impatiently at the coverlet, but said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, acting on his belief that life with this girl must always be
+more or less stormy, took a chance.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," he said, fixing his keen glance upon her, "about this quarrel you
+and your sister had yesterday?"</p>
+
+<p>She frowned and waved her right hand in careless dismissal of the
+subject.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that," she said, "didn't amount to anything."</p>
+
+<p>"What was it about?"</p>
+
+<p>"I really don't know. You see, my sister and I didn't get along very well
+together."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow put out his hand, and Greenleaf handed him the ring that had been
+found in Morley's room at the Brevord.</p>
+
+<p>"This ring," he said; "whose is it?"</p>
+
+<p>She sat up straight and gasped. Her pallor grew. Even her lips went
+thoroughly white.</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you get that?" she asked huskily.</p>
+
+<p>"It doesn't matter. Whose is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"It&mdash;it was my sister's," she said, almost in a whisper.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know who gave it to Mr. Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>She stared, speechless, at Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you know?" he persisted.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she said with obvious effort; "I&mdash;I lent it to him."</p>
+
+<p>"When?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yest&mdash;last night."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>She tried to smile, but her features were moulded more nearly to a
+grimace.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Morley and I&mdash;and I&mdash;have been engaged," she laboured to explain.
+"He said he wanted to wear it for a while just because it belonged to
+me."</p>
+
+<p>"But he knew it didn't belong to you, didn't he?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," she corrected herself, "he meant he wanted to wear it
+because I had worn it."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," commented Bristow, and added very quickly: "How much of your
+sister's jewelry is in this house now?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Fulton stared at him again, and did not answer.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't you tell me?" he urged. "How much?"</p>
+
+<p>She turned her head from him and looked out of the window.</p>
+
+<p>"None of it," she replied finally. "I had Miss Kelly look for it. It's
+all&mdash;gone."</p>
+
+<p>"Why did you have Miss Kelly look for it? What made you suspect that it
+was gone?"</p>
+
+<p>She turned to him and frowned more deeply, angrily.</p>
+
+<p>"It was, I suppose," she said shortly, "the first and most natural
+suspicion for any one to have; that, since she had been killed, she had
+been robbed. It was the only motive of which I could think."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," he agreed pleasantly, handing the ring back to the chief; "I think
+you're right there."</p>
+
+<p>He was silent for a full minute while the girl in the bed plucked at the
+coverlet and eyed first him and then Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton," he demanded more sharply than he had yet spoken, "did you
+see or hear anything last night in connection with this tragedy, the
+death of your sister?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; nothing," she answered, her voice now approaching firmness. It was a
+firmness, however, that was forced.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you explain that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I went to bed before my sister returned from the dinner dance, and I
+had taken something Dr. Braley had given me that breaks up the severe
+coughing attacks to which I am subject and that also puts me to sleep."</p>
+
+<p>"Makes you sleep soundly?"</p>
+
+<p>"Very."</p>
+
+<p>"It was a hypodermic injection, wasn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And you took it&mdash;administered it to yourself?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know what it was?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; morphine."</p>
+
+<p>"A sixteenth of a grain, wasn't it? That's what is always given to
+tuberculars to prevent violent spells of coughing, isn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>She hesitated, but finally assented.</p>
+
+<p>"But that's very little to make one sleep so soundly, that one couldn't
+hear the cries of a woman being murdered and all the noises that must
+have accompanied the attack upon her. Don't you think so?"</p>
+
+<p>"But, you must remember," she said tartly, "I'm not accustomed to taking
+morphine. Anyway, that's the way it affected me."</p>
+
+<p>"You heard absolutely nothing and saw nothing until you discovered your
+sister's body at ten o'clock this morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's true. Yes; that's true." She looked out of the window, paying him
+no more attention.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, in his turn, was silent. Greenleaf took up the inquiry:</p>
+
+<p>"Several times today, while you were asleep or delirious, you said the
+words: 'When he&mdash;say&mdash;I&mdash;asleep,' Can you explain that for us, Miss
+Fulton?"</p>
+
+<p>Her pallor deepened. This time terror flourished in her eyes as she
+turned sharply toward Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"Who says I said that?" she demanded, husky again.</p>
+
+<p>"Things are heard pretty easily in these bungalows," he said. "One of my
+men heard it."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I understand," she replied, a hint of craftiness creeping into her
+voice. "No; I can't explain it. One can't often explain one's ravings."</p>
+
+<p>"It merely suggested something that we had thought impossible," Bristow
+interjected soothingly: "that you might have wanted to deny having heard
+something which you really did hear; that you were protecting somebody."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," she said angrily, "that's absurd&mdash;utterly."</p>
+
+<p>"Quite," lied Bristow suavely. "That was what I told Chief Greenleaf."
+Then, with sharp directness, he asked her: "Who do you think killed your
+sister?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know! Oh, I don't know!" she cried shrilly, more than ever
+suggestive of the spoiled child.</p>
+
+<p>"It must have been some burglar. She was very popular, everybody said.
+She had no enemies."</p>
+
+<p>"None at all?"</p>
+
+<p>"None that I know of."</p>
+
+<p>"But Mr. Morley didn't like her, did he?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," she said slowly. "He didn't like her, but you couldn't have called
+him her enemy."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow moved his chair toward her several inches.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton," he asked, "you and Mr. Morley are engaged to be married,
+aren't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No!" she surprised him. "No; we're not!"</p>
+
+<p>He did not tell her that Morley had said they were.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf was now clearly conscious of what he had vaguely felt while
+listening to Bristow's questioning of Withers: the lame man had the
+faculty of seeming entirely inoffensive in his queries but at the same
+time putting into his voice an irritating, challenging quality which was
+bound to work on the feelings of the person to whom he talked. He had
+begun to have this effect on Miss Fulton.</p>
+
+<p>"I understood," he informed her, "that you were&mdash;er&mdash;quite fond of each
+other."</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all! Not at all!" she denied with increasing vehemence. "I'm not
+engaged to him now. Nothing could induce me to marry him!"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Morley declared this morning that you and he were to be married."</p>
+
+<p>She caught herself up quickly, anger evident in her eyes, and at the same
+time, also, a look of caution. Bristow decided she wanted to tell
+nothing, to give him no advantage, no actual insight into the clouded
+situation.</p>
+
+<p>"I see what you mean," she said. "We were engaged, but I finally decided
+that our marriage was impossible&mdash;because of this&mdash;my illness."</p>
+
+<p>"And you told him so?"</p>
+
+<p>She thought a long moment before she answered:</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"When?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yesterday."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, when did you give him&mdash;let him have Mrs. Withers' ring?"</p>
+
+<p>She showed signs of weakening.</p>
+
+<p>"Yesterday," she declared. "No! Last night, I've already told you."</p>
+
+<p>"And why did he want the ring last night when you had broken with him
+earlier yesterday?"</p>
+
+<p>His subtle irritation of her by his manner and tone had unstrung her at
+last.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," she cried, hysterics in her voice. "Oh, I don't know! Why
+do you ask me all these foolish little questions?" She tore unconsciously
+at the counterpane, her fingers writhing against one another. "Please,
+please don't bother me any more! Leave me! Leave me now, won't you?"</p>
+
+<p>The high, shrill quality of her tone brought Miss Kelly into the room.</p>
+
+<p>"I think," the nurse said, "you gentlemen will have to put off further
+conversation with Miss Fulton&mdash;if you can. The doctor said she was not
+to be subjected to too much excitement."</p>
+
+<p>They already had risen.</p>
+
+<p>"We've very much obliged to you, Miss Fulton," Bristow said in his
+pseudo-pleasant way. "It may be useful to us to know about you and Mr.
+Mor&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He was interrupted by a cry from the girl. Without the slightest warning,
+she had lost the last shred of her self-control. She began to beat on the
+covering of her bed with clenched fists. He could see how her whole body
+moved and twisted.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, startled by the girl's demeanour, moved further from her.
+Bristow stood his ground, watching her closely.</p>
+
+<p>She glared at him with the wild look that frequently comes to the
+hysterical or neurotic woman's eyes. She did not seem to be suffering.
+She was angry, carried away by her rage, and giving vent to it without
+any attempt at restraint!</p>
+
+<p>In two or three seconds she had become suggestive of an animal, her
+nostrils distended, the upper lip drawn back from her teeth. Bristow,
+going beyond surface indications, estimated her at her true worth: "Too
+much indulged; overshadowed, perhaps, by some older member of the family;
+but capable of big things, even charm. She's far from being a nonentity.
+She may help me yet."</p>
+
+<p>He regarded her calmly, and smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't mention him to me again!" she screamed. "I won't have it! I won't
+have it, I tell you! I never want to see him again&mdash;never! Don't speak
+the name of Henry Morley in&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>But Miss Kelly had quickly motioned them out and closed the door. Even on
+the outside, however, they could hear her shrill, whining protest against
+any mention of Morley.</p>
+
+<p>"Now!" said Greenleaf as they went through the living room. "What do you
+make of that?"</p>
+
+<p>They left the house and stood on the sidewalk outside.</p>
+
+<p>"Not much," Bristow replied, thinking deeply. "What with Withers throwing
+a fit, and then this girl having, or shamming, hysterics, it's
+disappointing. But here's a question: what has Morley done since last
+evening to make her hate him&mdash;at least, to make her look frightened when
+his name is mentioned to her?"</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think?"</p>
+
+<p>"I should say murder, or something just a little short of
+murder&mdash;wouldn't you?"</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf looked his bewilderment.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he objected. "I don't believe she'd protect him if she knew he'd
+killed her sister."</p>
+
+<p>"Not if she knew, perhaps," Bristow pursued ruminatively. "But if she
+suspected, merely suspected?"</p>
+
+<p>The chief did not answer this. He was clinging now to the theory of
+Perry's guilt. It seemed to him the easiest one to prove.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way, Mr. Bristow," he suggested, "wouldn't it be a good idea for
+us to search the yard and garden back of this house?"</p>
+
+<p>"What for?"</p>
+
+<p>"There's always the chance that the murderer, in running away, dropped
+something, even a part of the plunder. Then, too, remember the buttons."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I see what you mean, but it's getting late now. The light's none
+too good&mdash;and I'm tired, chief, tired out. Suppose we let that go until
+tomorrow&mdash;or you do it alone."</p>
+
+<p>"No; I'll wait for you tomorrow. We can do it together."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," Bristow asked, as if suddenly remembering an important item, "what
+kind of shoes is Perry wearing?"</p>
+
+<p>"An old pair of high-topped tennis shoes&mdash;black canvas."</p>
+
+<p>"Rubber soles?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry," observed Bristow. "That's another complication. Morley wore
+rubbers last night. Either he or Perry might have made that footprint on
+the porch."</p>
+
+<p>"How about Withers?" Greenleaf advanced a new idea. "He didn't tell us
+anything he did after seeing Campbell leave here last night."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true. You'd better see him tonight. Ask him about that; and find
+out what time he returned to the Brevord. If you don't get it out of him
+tonight, you probably never will. By tomorrow, his detective, Braceway,
+will be on the scene, and the chances are that Withers will talk to him
+and not to us&mdash;that is, if he talks at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Then I'll see you in the morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; any time. I'll get up early. But, if you get anything out of
+Withers tonight, telephone me&mdash;or if your man Jenkins reports on his
+search for the fellow with the gold tooth."</p>
+
+<p>"O. K.," agreed the chief, and swung off down the hill.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, whom he had left absorbed in thought, turned after a few minutes
+and went back to the door of No. 5. Miss Kelly answered his ring.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry to disturb you," he said, his smile a compliment, "but there's
+something I'm very anxious for you to do for me. Will you clean Miss
+Fulton's finger nails as soon as you can? And I want you to keep
+everything you get as a result of that process."</p>
+
+<p>"Do her nails!" The nurse was amazed.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; please. I'll explain later. And another thing: don't cut the
+cuticle. Don't bother with that at all. Just get what's under the nails.
+You'd better use merely an orange stick, I think. Will you do that for me
+carefully&mdash;very carefully? It's of the greatest importance."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Kelly finally said she would.</p>
+
+<p>He went back to his own porch and sat a long time watching the last,
+fading rays of the sunset.</p>
+
+<p>But he was not thinking about the landscape.</p>
+
+<p>"This man Withers," he was reflecting, "and his getting this detective,
+Braceway. Let me think. I mustn't look at these things in the light of my
+theories only. Too much theorizing is confusing.</p>
+
+<p>"I want to get the angle of the ordinary man in the street. How would it
+look to him? Why, this way: either Withers is on the level and wants
+to do everything possible to have the murderer caught&mdash;or he's smart
+enough to employ Braceway in the knowledge that neither Braceway nor
+anybody else can get anything from him that he doesn't want to tell&mdash;I
+wonder."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h2>
+
+<h3>THE BREATH OF SCANDAL</h3>
+
+
+<p>A telegraph messenger laboured up to the hill on his bicycle and climbed
+the steps to the porch of No. 5, displaying in his hand several
+telegrams. Two other boys had preceded him within the last hour. Friends
+of the Fulton family, having read of the tragedy in afternoon papers
+throughout the country, were wiring their messages of sympathy.</p>
+
+<p>This was no little local, isolated affair, Bristow reflected. The
+prominence of the victim in Washington and in the South, together with
+the mystery surrounding the crime, made it a matter of national interest.
+If he could bring the thing to a successful issue, the capture and
+punishment of the right man, there would be fame in it for him. The
+thought stimulated him.</p>
+
+<p>A few minutes later Withers came up Manniston Road and went into No. 5.
+Soon after that Miss Kelly brought Bristow a little paper packet.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not sure I ought to do this," she said, "but, as long as the
+authorities have ordered it, I guess I'm safe. This is what I get as a
+result of 'doing' Miss Fulton's nails."</p>
+
+<p>He thanked her and reassured her.</p>
+
+<p>Mattie appeared at the door to tell him his supper was ready. Before he
+sat down at the table, he telephoned Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"There's something else I want you to send to Charlotte with the Perry
+package."</p>
+
+<p>"Same sort of thing?" inquired the chief.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;Miss Fulton's."</p>
+
+<p>"Wow!" barked Greenleaf over the wire. "I never thought of that."</p>
+
+<p>"That's all right, I nearly forgot it myself. How will you send for it?"</p>
+
+<p>The chief thought a moment.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll come after it myself," he said. "I'll be up there as soon as I see
+Withers. I want to talk to you about the inquest. It will be held at
+eleven o'clock tomorrow morning."</p>
+
+<p>"Come ahead," Bristow invited. "You'll have to be up here in this
+neighbourhood anyway if you want to see Withers. He came up to Number
+Five just a few minutes ago. You can catch him there."</p>
+
+<p>After supper he went back to the front porch in time to see in the dusk
+the white uniform and cap of a trained nurse as she came down the hill.
+He surmised that she was one of the six nurses who lived in No. 7, the
+house between his and that of the murdered woman. These nurses were
+employed throughout the day at the big sanitarium located just over the
+brow of the hill at the end of Manniston Road.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps, she could tell him what he wanted to know.</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon," he called to her persuasively, "but may I trouble
+you to come up here for a moment?"</p>
+
+<p>She obeyed the summons with slow, hesitant steps.</p>
+
+<p>He pushed forward a chair for her and bowed.</p>
+
+<p>"Unfortunately," he apologized, "I don't know your name."</p>
+
+<p>She enlightened him: "Rutgers; Miss Emily Rutgers." In his turn, he told
+her briefly of his connection with the murder.</p>
+
+<p>"I was wondering," he began, "whether you had ever heard anything unusual
+from Number Five."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Rutgers, who was blond and too fat, had a heavy, peculiarly hoarse
+voice. She wanted to be certain that he had authority to "question
+people" about the case. He made that clear to her.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes," she finally said. "Mrs. Withers and Miss Fulton quarreled a
+good deal. We girls had remarked on it. And yesterday they had an awful
+row. I heard some of it because it was in the middle of the day, and I
+had run down here from the sanitarium to fix up the laundry we'd
+forgotten early in the morning."</p>
+
+<p>"What did you hear?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was something about money. I didn't really try to listen, but I
+couldn't help hearing some of it, they talked so loud."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I got the idea that Miss Fulton wanted to borrow some money from Mrs.
+Withers for a purpose that Mrs. Withers didn't approve of. 'Well,' I
+heard Mrs. Withers say after Miss Fulton had almost screamed about it,
+'you can't have any more. I haven't got it. That's all there is to that.
+I can't let you have it when I haven't got it!'</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton said something&mdash;I think it was about Mr. Withers or about
+asking him for the money.</p>
+
+<p>"'You'd better not do that,' Mrs. Withers warned her. 'I tried that once,
+and he flew into a perfect rage. He was so worked up that he looked like
+a crazy man, like a man who would do anything. He looked as if he might
+kill me, choke me to death, anything!'"</p>
+
+<p>"Did Miss Fulton answer that?"</p>
+
+<p>"If she did, I didn't hear it. I just got the impression that they were
+both angry and mixed up in a terrific quarrel."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you ever heard anything else like that at any other time?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, we often heard them fussing. Miss Fulton did the fussing. Mrs.
+Withers was almost always gentle and calm. One other time I did hear Mrs.
+Withers say she'd lent Miss Fulton all she could afford."</p>
+
+<p>"When was that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Some time ago&mdash;a month or six weeks ago; maybe two months."</p>
+
+<p>"Money, always money," the lame man said.</p>
+
+<p>He was silent, thoughtful, for several minutes.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm ever so much obliged, Miss Rutgers," he said at last. "Every bit of
+evidence we can get will help us&mdash;perhaps."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Rutgers had risen.</p>
+
+<p>"There's one other thing, Mr. Bristow," she volunteered. "There was a
+man hanging around Number Five last night; rather, it was early this
+morning."</p>
+
+<p>"How do you know that?" His voice was at once urgent.</p>
+
+<p>"Bessie&mdash;Miss Hardesty and I have our beds on the sleeping porch. Hers is
+the one nearest to Number Five. She told me about it this morning. At
+about one o'clock&mdash;or between one and two&mdash;she thought she heard a sloppy
+footstep near the sleeping porch. At that time it was raining, but
+not hard&mdash;just a fine drizzle.</p>
+
+<p>"She went to the wiring that walls the sleeping porch on the end toward
+Number Five, and she made out the figure of a man coming from the front
+of Number Five and going toward the back fence. He had just passed the
+sleeping porch. She turned on the little flashlight we keep out there and
+saw him."</p>
+
+<p>"Who was it? Could she make him out at all?"</p>
+
+<p>"She said it was a negro."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she see his face?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not enough to recognize him, but enough to make her sure he was a black
+man."</p>
+
+<p>"She didn't try to identify him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, she thought it was the darky Perry who does so much work in this
+neighbourhood. She said she thought so because the figure of the man she
+saw in the rain reminded her of Perry's general appearance."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she call out to him?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; and he didn't run. He just walked fast and was out of sight in a
+moment. When I heard of the murder early this afternoon, I was up at the
+sanitarium, and I went to the matron and told her what I've just told
+you. It was her advice that, as soon as I got off duty, I should come
+down here and telephone what I knew to the police. She didn't want me to
+do it from the sanitarium because the patients might have heard it and
+become too much excited."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Where's Miss Hardesty now?"</p>
+
+<p>"This is her night on duty at the sanitarium."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Well, she'll have to testify at the inquest tomorrow. You might
+tell her that. Never mind, though. The police will notify her."</p>
+
+<p>"I know she won't like that much," Miss Rutgers declared; "but, of
+course, she'll tell what she knows. How about me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't say yet, but I don't think we'll need you at the inquest. We may
+need you later."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," she consented. "Let me know when the time comes. Good
+night, Mr. Bristow."</p>
+
+<p>He went inside and picked up a novel. He wanted to "clear his brain" for
+the talk with the chief of police.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf came in, looking downcast.</p>
+
+<p>"What did you get from Withers?" Bristow asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing but a good bawling out," the chief said testily. "We won't get
+anything more from him for some time. He told me so. He said: 'You
+fellows have been carrying things with a high hand today, questioning and
+frightening everybody with your hidden threats and third degrees. Get
+out! I'll do my talking to Sam Braceway tomorrow.' But I did ask him one
+question&mdash;the thing you wanted to know. I asked him whether he had worn
+rubber shoes last night."</p>
+
+<p>"What did he say?" Bristow was inwardly amused by Greenleaf's
+pertinacity.</p>
+
+<p>"He said it was none of my business; and he flew into a rage about
+it&mdash;worse than he was in here this morning. He looked like a crazy man.
+I watched him gesticulate and get red in the face and foam and splutter.
+Why, he looked like a man who might commit murder any moment."</p>
+
+<p>At that, Bristow started. The chief's words were strikingly like what
+Miss Rutgers had told him she had heard Mrs. Withers say: "He looked as
+if he might kill me, choke me to death, anything!"</p>
+
+<p>"He's going to spend the night in Number Five," Greenleaf concluded; "he
+and Miss Fulton and the nurse, Miss Kelly."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow tossed his novel into a vacant chair and spread out his hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, chief," he said, "what do you make out of all this? What do you
+intend to do at the inquest tomorrow? By the way, here's something you'll
+need."</p>
+
+<p>He related what Miss Rutgers had told him.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm willing to take your advice," Greenleaf announced, "but this is my
+idea: we'll present all we have against Perry, and have him held for the
+grand jury. We've got enough to do that&mdash;the buttons evidence, his
+failure to present anything like an alibi, the mark of the rubber sole on
+the front porch, the inability of the woman, Lucy Thomas, to say whether
+or not she gave Perry the kitchen key to Number Five."</p>
+
+<p>"She can't remember that, can she?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; not even when we've got her locked up in jail."</p>
+
+<p>"Chief, do you think Perry killed and robbed Mrs. Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think this," he replied: "it's an even chance he did. If he didn't,
+it's a sure thing that his being accused of it and locked up for it may
+make the real criminal more careless and give us a better chance to catch
+him."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; you're right. What reports have you had on the mysterious man
+Withers says he saw, the fellow with the long-visored cap, long raincoat,
+and gold tooth?"</p>
+
+<p>"A little something. Jenkins has scoured the town pretty well in the time
+he had, A clerk at Maplewood Inn thinks&mdash;<i>thinks</i>&mdash;he saw such a man in
+the lobby there about three weeks ago. And one of our patrolmen, Ashurst,
+says he's pretty certain he saw him two months ago near here, in fact
+down on Freeman Avenue near where Manniston Road branches off from it. It
+was at night, nearly midnight."</p>
+
+<p>"Did Ashurst watch him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Only carelessly. Says he saw him walk on down Freeman Avenue as if he
+intended going into the town."</p>
+
+<p>"What did the clerk see? What did this fellow do in the Maplewood Inn
+lobby?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing&mdash;came in, bought a pack of cigarettes, and went out."</p>
+
+<p>"Anybody else seen him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not so far as we've been able to discover."</p>
+
+<p>"Has he ever registered at any of the hotels here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not that we can find; no, never."</p>
+
+<p>"Funny," ruminated Bristow, "very funny. Yes, I think you're right,
+chief. Put up the case against Perry until we can do something better
+or prove it on him absolutely. Of course, if the laboratory test shows
+that he had human flesh&mdash;a white person's flesh&mdash;under his finger nails,
+that will settle it in my mind. There couldn't be any other answer."</p>
+
+<p>"Will the test show whether it's a white person's skin or a nigger's?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. There's no pigment in a white person's skin."</p>
+
+<p>"Is that so? That's something I never knew before. Anyway, it certainly
+will nail him, won't it? But, you don't feel anyways sure Perry's the
+guilty man, do you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I can't say I do. I'll tell you what we've got to consider, and it's
+not a very pretty theory; either that Morley killed Mrs. Withers, and
+Miss Fulton knows it; or that Morley and Miss Fulton together killed her;
+or that, although Perry killed her, we, in looking for the murderer, have
+come pretty near to stumbling on some sort of a nasty family scandal,
+something in which Maria Fulton, Enid Withers and George Withers, with
+perhaps another man, all have been mixed up.</p>
+
+<p>"I mean a scandal ugly enough for all the rest of them to make desperate
+attempts to keep it hidden, even when Mrs. Withers is dead and gone.
+Frankly, I didn't believe Withers was in on the murder or that he
+believes Maria had anything to do with it or knows how it was done.</p>
+
+<p>"But Maria Fulton&mdash;that's different. How else are we to explain her
+behaviour with us when we tried to interview her, the fact of her sudden
+abhorrence for Morley, the man to whom she was engaged only yesterday?</p>
+
+<p>"And how else are we to explain Morley's unexplained two hours of last
+night, and his apparent terror today, and his whole connection with the
+case&mdash;the matter of the ring found in his hotel room, and all that?
+There's something fishy about this thing somehow, something fishy that
+includes Maria Fulton and Morley.</p>
+
+<p>"This fellow with the brown beard and the gold tooth strengthens the
+theory of some rotten scandal. He must be mixed up in it some way. I'll
+bet anything, though, that he had nothing to do with the murder. That's
+what we want to get at&mdash;this inside scandal, this something which existed
+long before the murder but yet may have led indirectly to the murder."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf sighed and passed his hand wearily across his eyes. He had had
+a hard day, the hardest day of his life.</p>
+
+<p>"But you think my plan for the inquest is all right?" he asked once more.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; it's the best thing possible. By the way, don't have me summoned to
+testify. Leave my evidence until the trial. I don't want to wear myself
+out going down there for merely an inquest."</p>
+
+<p>"All right; I'll fix that. We've enough evidence without yours&mdash;enough
+for the inquest, anyway."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow looked at his watch, and Greenleaf got up to go.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll be up here between eight and nine tomorrow morning," he said, "if
+that suits you."</p>
+
+<p>"What for?"</p>
+
+<p>"To get a good look at the grounds back of Number Five. If the murderer
+dropped anything, I want to be the man to pick it up."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'd forgotten that," Bristow said in a tone indicating his
+hopelessness of finding anything worth while. "Yes; I'll be ready for
+you."</p>
+
+<p>Something else was on Greenleaf's mind.</p>
+
+<p>"This Braceway," he said sarcastically, "the smartest detective in the
+South. He'll be here in the morning. What will we do? Work with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure," Bristow replied heartily, as if to fore-stall the other's dislike
+of the new-comer. "Even if he were no good, the best thing we could do
+would be to work with him. And, as he's something of a world-beater,
+we'll get the benefit of his ideas. By all means, let's all keep together
+on this thing."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," Greenleaf agreed, his tone a little surly. "Your appointment
+to my force is O. K. I fixed that this afternoon. Good night."</p>
+
+<p>"Good night&mdash;and don't forget to send that stuff off to the Charlotte
+laboratory tonight. If we can find out who scratched somebody last night,
+if we can determine who had little bits of foreign skin under the finger
+nails today, we've got the answer to this murder mystery. That's one
+thing sure."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow turned off the lights in the living room and went to his dressing
+room to prepare for bed on the sleeping porch.</p>
+
+<p>"Money," he was thinking as he undressed; "money and fifteen thousand
+dollars' worth of jewelry. Where has it all gone? That's the thing that
+will settle this case, and I think&mdash;I think I've a pretty good idea of
+what will be proved about it."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h2>
+
+<h3>WOMEN'S NERVES</h3>
+
+
+<p>Lucy Thomas in a cell in the Furmville jail sat on the edge of her cot
+at midnight, staring into inky darkness while she tried to remember
+the events of the night before. She was not of the slow-witted,
+stupid-looking type of negro women. The thing against which she struggled
+was not poverty of brain but the mist of forgetfulness with which the
+fumes of liquor had surrounded her.</p>
+
+<p>Questioned and requestioned by the police during the afternoon and early
+evening, she had been able to tell them only that she and Perry had been
+drinking together in her little two-room cabin. When he had left her,
+what he had said, whether he had returned&mdash;these points were as
+effectually covered up in her mind as if she had never had cognizance of
+them.</p>
+
+<p>She did remember, however, certain things which she had not imparted to
+the police. One was that at some time during the night there had been a
+struggle between herself and Perry. The other was that at some time,
+far into the night or very early in the morning, she had heard the
+clank-clank of the iron key falling on the floor of her house, a key
+which she had worn suspended on a ribbon round her neck.</p>
+
+<p>She rocked herself back and forth on the cot, her head throbbing, her
+mouth parched, tears in her eyes. To the white people, she thought, it
+did not matter much, but to her the fact that she and Perry had intended
+to get married was the biggest thing in her life.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know; I don't know," her thoughts ran bitterly. "Ef Perry tuk
+dat key away fum me, he mus' done gawn to dat house&mdash;an' he wuz full uv
+likker. Ef he ain' done tuk dat key fum me an' den later flung it back on
+de flo' uv my house, who did do it?"</p>
+
+<p>She sobbed afresh.</p>
+
+<p>"He is one mean nigger when he gits too much likker in him. Ain' nobody
+knows dat better'n I does. An' he sayed somethin' las' night 'bout
+gittin' a whole lot uv money. He&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She moaned and flung herself backward on the cot.</p>
+
+<p>"Gawd have mussy! Gawd have mussy! I done remembuhed. I done remembuhed.
+He done say somethin' 'bout dat white woman's gol' an' jewelery. Gawd!
+Dat's whut he done. He done it! Dat's why he wuz fightin' me. He wuz
+tryin' to git dat kitchen key. An' he got it! He got it! Ef he done kilt
+dat woman, de white folks goin' to git him sho'ly&mdash;sho'ly. An' him an' me
+ain' nevuh gwine git married&mdash;nevuh. Dey'll kill him or dey'll sen' him
+to dat pen. Aw, my Gawd! My Gawd!"</p>
+
+<p>She sat up again and began to think about Mrs. Withers, how well the
+slain woman had treated her, how kindly. From that, her thoughts went to
+ghosts. She fell to trembling and moaning in an audible key. It was not
+long before a warden, awakened by her cries of terror, had to visit her
+and threaten bodily punishment if she did not keep quiet.</p>
+
+<p>After a while, she relapsed into her quiet sobbing.</p>
+
+<p>"I think maybe he done tuk dat key. I knows he done lef' me durin' de
+night, an' I b'lieve he done come back. But I ain't gwine say nothin'.
+Maybe I don' know. Maybe I is mistuk. De whole thing done got too mix' up
+fuh me. Maybe he kilt her an' maybe he ain' been nigh de place. But I
+wish I coul' know. My holy Lawd! I wish I done know all dat done happen.</p>
+
+<p>"Dat key fallin' on de flo'. Who done drap it dar ef Perry ain' drapped
+it? Dat's whut I'd like to know. Ef he ain' had dat key, ain' nobody
+had it."</p>
+
+<p>She lay down, weeping and sobbing from unhappiness and terror. Bristow
+and Greenleaf would have given much to have known her suspicions,
+suspicions which amounted to a moral certainty.</p>
+
+<p>On the sleeping porch of No. 5, Manniston Road, Maria Fulton lay awake a
+long time and tortured herself by reviewing again and again the thoughts
+that had crushed her during the day. Miss Kelly, on a cot at the foot of
+the girl's bed, heard her stirring restlessly but could not know in the
+darkness how her long, slender fingers tore at the bed-covering, nor how
+her face was drawn with pain.</p>
+
+<p>"The overturning of that chair,"&mdash;her mind whirled the events before
+her&mdash;"the sound of that whisper, that man's whisper, and the sight of
+that foot! He wore rubbers. I know he did. He always wears them when it's
+even cloudy. It was he! It was he!"</p>
+
+<p>Her nails dug into her palms as she fought for something like
+self-control.</p>
+
+<p>"If it was not he? I would never have fainted&mdash;never. That's what made me
+faint, the sickening, undeniable knowledge that that was who it was. And
+I loved him! But&mdash;but the rubber-shod foot, the size of it! Am I sure?
+Could it have been&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She groaned so that Miss Kelly lifted her head from her own pillow and
+listened intently, trying to determine whether the sufferer was asleep or
+awake.</p>
+
+<p>"He's not stupid," she swept on, closing mutinous lips against the
+repetition of sound. "He knew Enid could do nothing&mdash;nothing more. I
+don't understand. Oh, I don't understand! I wonder now why I said I heard
+nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder why I lay unconscious on the floor near the dining room door
+all those hours&mdash;until ten o'clock this morning. It was because the
+knowledge was too much for me to stand&mdash;just as it is too much now. And
+I can't share it with anybody. I'll never be able to get it off my
+conscience. If I did, they'd hang him&mdash;or the other one who&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>At that thought, she screamed aloud, a wild, eerie sound that chilled the
+blood of even Miss Kelly, accustomed as she was to the cries of suffering
+and despair. The nurse was at the hysterical girl's side in a moment,
+holding her quivering body in strong, capable arms.</p>
+
+<p>"What was it? What was it, Miss Fulton?" she asked soothingly.</p>
+
+<p>Maria brushed the back of her hand across her forehead, which was beaded
+with big, cold drops of perspiration.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing, Miss Kelly; nothing," she half-moaned. "A bad dream, a
+nightmare, I guess. Give me something to make me sleep."</p>
+
+<p>She drank eagerly from a glass the nurse put to her lips.</p>
+
+<p>"If I begin to talk in my sleep, Miss Kelly, call me, wake me up, will
+you?" she begged, the fright still in her voice.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I will." This reassuringly while Miss Kelly smoothed the pillows
+and readjusted the tumbled coverings.</p>
+
+<p>Maria grasped her arm in a grip that hurt.</p>
+
+<p>"But will you?" she demanded sharply. "Promise me!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; indeed, I will. I promise."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Kelly meant what she said. She was not anxious to be the recipient
+of the sick girl's confidences.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h2>
+
+<h3>EYES OF ACCUSATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Bristow, at his early breakfast, devoted himself, between mouthfuls, to
+the front page of <i>The Furmville Sentinel</i>. It was given up entirely to
+the Withers murder.</p>
+
+<p>"Murder&mdash;murder horrible and mysterious&mdash;was committed early yesterday
+morning," announced the paper in large black-face type, "when the
+beautiful and charming Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers, wife of George S.
+Withers, the well-known attorney of Atlanta, was choked to death in the
+parlour of her home at No. 5 Manniston Road. The most heinous crime that
+has ever stained the annals of Furmville," etc.</p>
+
+<p>The article went on to recite that Chief Greenleaf of the Furmville
+police force had been fortunate in securing the assistance of a genius in
+running down the various clues that seemed to point to the guilty party.
+Mr. Lawrence Bristow, of Cincinnati, now in town for his health, had
+worked with him all day in unearthing many circumstances "which, although
+each of them seemed trivial, led when summed up to the almost irrefutable
+conviction that the murder was done by a drunken negro, Perry Carpenter,"
+etc.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of this, the paper continued, the dead woman's husband, arriving
+unexpectedly on the scene, had employed by wire Samuel S. Braceway, the
+professional detective of Atlanta, who would reach Furmville early this
+morning and, probably, work with Chief Greenleaf, Mr. Bristow, and the
+plain-clothes squad in the effort to remove all doubts of the guilt of
+the accused negro.</p>
+
+<p>There followed a sketch of Braceway which was enough to convince the
+readers that in him Mr. Withers had called into the case the shrewdest
+man in the South, "very probably the shrewdest man in the entire
+country."</p>
+
+<p>"Evidently," Bristow was thinking when Greenleaf rang the door-bell,
+"while I'm a 'genius,' Braceway's the man everybody relies on when it
+comes to catching the murderer."</p>
+
+<p>The chief was in a hurry, and the two men, going out of Bristow's back
+door, walked down to the corner of the sleeping porch of No. 7, the
+nurses' home. The frail wire fences that had served to partition the back
+lots of Nos. 5, 7, and 9 had either fallen down or been carried away, but
+there was a tall five-board fence at the rear of the three lots. From
+this board fence, the hill sloped down toward the southeast, the
+direction in which the negro settlement containing the home of Lucy
+Thomas was located.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, frankly bored by the belated search, let Greenleaf lead the way.</p>
+
+<p>"I went up to the sanitarium late last night," the chief told him, "and
+had a long talk with Miss Hardesty. She says the man she saw night before
+last was right here, just a few yards from this Number Seven sleeping
+porch; and, it seemed to her, he made straight for the board fence. We'll
+follow in his footsteps. That will take up to the fence in the middle of
+the rear line of Number Seven's lot."</p>
+
+<p>He was following this route as he talked, Bristow limping a few yards
+behind him.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf overlooked nothing. The lot had been cleared of last winter's
+leaves, and the search was comparatively simple, but, if he saw even so
+much as a small stick on either side of him, he turned it over. They were
+soon at the fence, about twenty yards from the sleeping porch.</p>
+
+<p>"There's not a trace&mdash;not a trace of anything, chief," said Bristow,
+leaning one elbow on the top board of the fence.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, however, was not to be discouraged. After he had walked around
+again and again in ever-widening circles, he stopped and thought.</p>
+
+<p>"If that nigger was running away and trying to make good time," he
+exclaimed, suddenly inspired, "he didn't jump the fence in the middle
+there, where you are. He took a line slanting down toward that negro
+settlement. The chances are he went over the fence down at that corner."</p>
+
+<p>He pointed to the southeastern corner back of No. 5 and, with his eyes on
+the ground, began to work toward it.</p>
+
+<p>Barely a yard from the corner, he stooped down swiftly, picked up
+something and turned joyfully toward Bristow, who still leaned against
+the fence.</p>
+
+<p>"Look here! Look here, Mr. Bristow," he called, hurrying across to him.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow examined the object Greenleaf had found. It consisted of six
+links of a gold chain, three of the links very small and of plain gold,
+the other alternating three links being larger and chased with a fine,
+exquisite design of laurel leaves, the leaves so small as to be barely
+distinguishable to the naked eye.</p>
+
+<p>The lame man shared the chief's excitement.</p>
+
+<p>"By George! You've got something worth while. I should say so!"</p>
+
+<p>"What do you make of it?" asked Greenleaf, eager and pleased. "It must
+have belonged to Mrs. Withers, don't you think?"</p>
+
+<p>"There's one way to find out," Bristow answered, looking at his watch. It
+was half-past eight o'clock. "Let's go and ask Withers."</p>
+
+<p>They went around to the front of No. 5.</p>
+
+<p>"One of the end links is broken," Bristow said as they ascended the
+steps. "My guess is that this is a part of the necklace Mrs. Withers wore
+when she was killed. You remember the mark on the back of her neck. It
+might have been made by the jerk that would have been required to break
+these links."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Kelly, answering their ring, told them Mr. Withers had gone to the
+railroad station to meet Mr. Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"Then, too," she added, "Miss Fulton's father is due on the nine o'clock
+train. Mr. Withers may stop down town to meet him."</p>
+
+<p>"I'd forgotten about that," said Bristow. "We'll have to ask your help."
+He handed her the fragment of chain. "Will you be so kind as to take
+that back to Miss Fulton and ask her whether she recognizes it, whether
+she can identify it?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Kelly complied with the request at once.</p>
+
+<p>She returned in a few moments.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton," she reported, handing the links back to Bristow, "says
+this is a part of the chain Mrs. Withers wore round her neck night before
+last. She wore a lavalliere; it had two emeralds and eighteen rather
+small diamonds."</p>
+
+<p>"Good!" exclaimed Greenleaf, glancing at the lame man. "I guess that
+fixes Perry."</p>
+
+<p>"Undoubtedly," Bristow assented; and spoke to Miss Kelly: "I beg your
+pardon, but is Miss Fulton up this morning, or will she be up later?"</p>
+
+<p>"She's dressing now. She wants to be up to meet her father."</p>
+
+<p>"In that case, I'll wait until later. What I would like to have is a
+complete, detailed description of all of Mrs. Withers' jewelry. I wish
+you'd mention that to her, will you?"</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf was anxious to return to his office.</p>
+
+<p>"This last piece of evidence," he said, "ought to go to the coroner's
+jury. It clinches the case against Perry. Here's the whole business in a
+nutshell: the buttons missing from his blouse, one found in Number Five,
+the other in your bungalow; Miss Hardesty's having seen him the night of
+the murder; the ease with which he undoubtedly got the kitchen key from
+Lucy Thomas; the imprint of his rubber-soled shoe on the porch; the
+finding of this piece of gold chain; and his failure to establish an
+alibi. It's more than enough to have him held for the grand jury&mdash;it's
+murder in the first degree."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow went back to his porch. Looking down to his left and through the
+trees, he commanded a view of Freeman Avenue.</p>
+
+<p>"When I see an automobile flash past that spot," he decided, "I'll hurry
+down to Number Five. I want to be there to witness the meeting between
+Miss Fulton and her father. It may be possible that, when this
+scandal&mdash;whatever it was&mdash;was about to break concerning Mrs. Withers,
+this family was lucky enough to have a negro hauled up as the murderer.
+In any event, it's up to me to keep track of the relations between
+Fulton, his daughter, Withers, and Morley. The psychology of the
+situation now is as important as any material evidence."</p>
+
+<p>He did not have long to wait. At a quarter past nine he caught a glimpse
+of a big car speeding out Freeman Avenue. He sprang to his feet, hurried
+down to No. 5, rang the bell, and was inside the living room by the time
+the machine had climbed up Manniston Road and deposited in front of the
+door its one passenger. He was a man of sixty-five or sixty-seven years
+of age, very white of hair, very erect of figure.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow did not have time or need to formulate an excuse for his presence
+before Mr. Fulton rushed up the steps to meet Maria. As she came from the
+direction of the bedrooms to greet him, her expression had in it
+reluctance, timidity even.</p>
+
+<p>The father and daughter met in the centre of the living room. Bristow,
+stationed near the corner by the door, could see their faces. He watched
+them with attention strained to the utmost.</p>
+
+<p>In the eyes of Maria there was a great fear mingled with a look of
+pleading. The old man's face was deep-lined; under his eyes were dark
+pouches; and his lips were tightly compressed, as if he sought to prevent
+his bursting into condemnation.</p>
+
+<p>With a little catch in her voice, Maria cried out, "Father!" and stood
+watching him.</p>
+
+<p>For a moment the old man's eyes were dreary with accusation. Bristow had
+never seen an emotion mirrored so clearly, so indisputably, in anybody's
+eyes. It was a speaking, thundering light, he thought.</p>
+
+<p>The father, without opening his mouth, plainly said to the girl:</p>
+
+<p>"At last, you've killed her! It's all your fault. You've killed her."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow read that as easily as if it had been held before him in printed
+words. So, apparently, did Miss Fulton. The pleading expression left her
+face, and, in place of it, was only a flourishing, lively fear.</p>
+
+<p>But Fulton put out his arms and gathered her into them, took hold of her
+mechanically, displaying neither fondness nor a desire to comfort and
+soothe.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow quietly left the room and returned to his porch.</p>
+
+<p>"Her father," he analyzed what he had seen, "blames her for the
+tragedy&mdash;possibly believes her guilty of the actual murder. Why? This is
+a new angle&mdash;brand new."</p>
+
+<p>He went in and called up Greenleaf, only to be told that the chief had
+left word he was to be found at the Brevord Hotel. Telephoning there, he
+got him on the wire.</p>
+
+<p>"Neither Withers nor Braceway came up here with old Mr. Fulton," he
+began.</p>
+
+<p>"I know," put in the chief. "I'm down here to meet Braceway now. He and
+Withers are in conference. Braceway doesn't want to go to the inquest.
+I'm to take him by the undertaker's to look at the body, and then he
+wants to run up to see you. Says he won't learn anything important at the
+inquest; he'd rather talk to you."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," returned Bristow. "That suits me perfectly. When will he be
+here?"</p>
+
+<p>"In half an hour, I suppose. And I'll run up as soon as the inquest is
+over."</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder," Bristow communed again with himself, "whether this Braceway
+is on the level, whether Withers is on the level. What's their game&mdash;to
+find the real murderer or to shut up a family scandal?"</p>
+
+<p>The scandal theory bothered him. He saw no way of getting at it.</p>
+
+<p>In less than an hour he and Braceway were shaking hands on the porch of
+No. 9. Bristow, studying him rapidly, motioned him to a chair.</p>
+
+<p>Here was no ordinary police-detective type. This man had neither
+square-toed shoes, nor a bull neck, nor coarseness of feature. About
+thirty-six years old, he was unusually slender, and straight as a dart,
+a peculiar and restless gracefulness characterizing all his movements. He
+seemed fairly to exude energy. He was keyed up to lightning-like motion.
+He gave the impression of having a brain that worked with the precision
+and force of some great machine, a machine that never missed fire.</p>
+
+<p>From the toes of his highly polished tan shoes to the sheen of his blond
+hair and the crown of his nobby straw hat, he looked like a well dressed
+and prosperous professional man. His dark gray suit with a thin thread of
+pale green in it, his silver-gray necktie, the gloves he carried in his
+left hand, every detail of his appearance marked him, first as a "snappy
+dresser," and second as a highly efficient man.</p>
+
+<p>While they exchanged casual greetings, Braceway lit a cigarette and spun
+the match, with a droning sound, far out from the porch. He did this, as
+he did everything else, with a "flaire," with that indefinable something
+which marks every man who has a strong personality. There was in all his
+bearing a dash, an electric emphasis.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think, Mr. Bristow?" He got down to business at once. "Did
+this negro Perry kill Mrs. Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway blew out a big cloud of smoke and looked intently at his new
+acquaintance.</p>
+
+<p>"I've talked to Greenleaf," he supplemented. "I suppose he gave me all
+the facts you've collected. But Greenleaf&mdash;you know what I mean," he
+waved his cigarette hand expressively; "I wouldn't say he had
+extraordinary powers of divination. He's a good fellow, and all that,
+but&mdash;what do you think?"</p>
+
+<p>"On the evidence alone, so far," Bristow answered with an appreciative,
+warming smile, "I'd say Perry committed the crime."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh; yes, sure." He moved quickly in his chair. "On the evidence, but
+there are other things, other factors. What do you think?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid that's my trouble," Bristow told him. "I've been thinking so
+much that I'm somewhat muddled. But I believe there may be something more
+than a negro's greed back of this thing."</p>
+
+<p>"Now you're speaking mouthfuls," Braceway said, smiling brightly. "Tell
+me about it."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow told him&mdash;about Withers' peculiar behaviour; the whole case
+against Perry; the illusive personage with the chestnut beard and gold
+tooth; Morley's suspicious story and actions; and, lastly, Maria Fulton's
+highly puzzling narrative of what she had seen and not seen in connection
+with the murder.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway listened with complete absorption, in a way that showed he was
+photographing each incident and statement on his brain.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," he began with almost explosive suddenness, "let's get this
+straight. I want to work with you, if you'll let me." He paused long
+enough for Bristow to nod a pleased assent. "And I believe there's
+something back of this crime that nobody has yet put his finger on. Mr.
+Withers believes it. Don't make any mistake about that. Withers is as
+anxious to get the real criminal as you and I are."</p>
+
+<p>"Let me understand," Bristow said in his turn. "Do you propose that we
+work on the case with the supposition that Withers is in no way
+responsible for any part of the tragedy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Absolutely!" snapped out Braceway, thoroughly good natured despite his
+abruptness. "At least, that's my plan. I'm certain Withers had nothing to
+do with it."</p>
+
+<p>For the first time, something far back in Bristow's brain stirred
+uneasily, as if, miles away, somebody had sounded an alarm. Should he
+trust this man? Would Braceway try to pick up a false scent, try to throw
+the whole thing out of gear?</p>
+
+<p>Although he, Bristow, had expressed to Greenleaf only last night his
+confidence in Withers' innocence, would it be wise to hold to such a
+belief? The future was too uncertain, too apt to produce entirely
+unexpected things. At any rate, it would be silly to call himself
+anything of a criminologist; and yet go ahead with a blind, spoken
+conviction of the innocence of a man who unquestionably had acted in a
+way to bring suspicion upon himself.</p>
+
+<p>He would wait and see. He purposed to throw away no card that might later
+take a trick.</p>
+
+<p>"Very good," he said. "That suits me if you're satisfied. You can answer
+for him, I don't doubt."</p>
+
+<p>"Thoroughly so. In the first place, he and I are close personal friends;
+went to college together; were fraternity mates; had an office together
+until I quit practising law and went in for this sort of work. Then, too,
+I've turned him inside out this morning. He doesn't know a thing.</p>
+
+<p>"And, I might as well tell you now, he didn't hang around Manniston Road
+night before last after his wife got in. As soon as he saw this Douglas
+Campbell go home he returned to the Brevord and went to bed.</p>
+
+<p>"No, sirree! Here's what I work on: either Morley killed her, or the
+negro killed her, or it was done by the mysterious fellow with the gold
+tooth. How does that strike you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Correctly; I'm with you," agreed Bristow, still with the mental
+reservation that he would deal with Withers as he saw fit.</p>
+
+<p>"One thing more," added Braceway, and Bristow was surprised to see that
+he looked a trifle embarrassed; "I want you to handle all the talk that
+has to be had with Miss Maria Fulton. I'll be frank with you; I have to
+be. It's this way: I was once in love with her; in fact, engaged to marry
+her. Do you see?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fully."</p>
+
+<p>He was glad to know at the outset that Braceway was a friend of the
+family. It might be valuable later.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway threw away his cigarette and sighed with relief.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad you understand," he said. "Now, about Withers: things have
+begun to happen to him already&mdash;this morning. Since this has hit him, he
+doesn't know where he'll get off eventually. I'll tell you."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h2>
+
+<h3>THE $1,000 CHECK.</h3>
+
+
+<p>A few minutes after eight o'clock that morning Mr. Illington, president
+of the Furmville National Bank, had called at the Brevord to see Mr.
+Withers, who, still holding his room there, was waiting for the delayed
+morning train.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Illington was of the true banker type, fifty years old, immaculately
+dressed, thin of lip, hard of eye, slow and precise in his enunciation.
+He had, apparently, estranged himself from any deep, human feeling. The
+long handling of money had hardened him. His fingers were long and
+grasping, and his voice was quite as metallic as the clink of gold coins
+one upon the other.</p>
+
+<p>At Mr. Withers' invitation he took a chair in Mr. Withers' room. He
+rubbed his dry, slender hands together and cleared his throat, after
+which he spoke his little set speech of condolence.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withers, haggard from grief and lack of sleep, waved aside these
+preliminary remarks.</p>
+
+<p>The banker put his hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a bulky
+envelope, from which he produced a long, rectangular piece of paper.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew you would prefer to learn of this at first hand from the bank;
+indeed, from me, its president. Yesterday, Mr. Withers, a promissory
+note, a sixty-day note, for a thousand dollars fell due in the Furmville
+National Bank. You might like to see it. Here it is."</p>
+
+<p>He handed the piece of paper to Withers, who saw that the note had been
+signed by Maria Fulton and endorsed by Enid Fulton Withers. The husband
+of the dead woman was too astonished to comment.</p>
+
+<p>"We acted as&mdash;as leniently in the matter as we could, perhaps more
+leniently than was strictly proper in banking circles," Mr. Illington was
+pleased to explain. "I myself called up Miss Fulton on the telephone
+yesterday, but naturally she was so agitated that she seemed unable to
+give me any information as to what she intended to do regarding
+the&mdash;er&mdash;liquidation of this indebtedness."</p>
+
+<p>"And," concluded Withers, passing the note back to him, "since my wife
+was the endorser, it's up to me to make the note good, to pay the bank
+the thousand dollars."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Illington was glad to see how thoroughly the bereaved husband
+appreciated the situation.</p>
+
+<p>"Quite right, entirely so," he said. "And will you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course."</p>
+
+<p>"Ahem&mdash;When?" inquired the banker, assuming an expression of casual
+interest.</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't that much money on deposit in Atlanta, but I can get it. I
+return to Atlanta this afternoon. I can send the money to you tomorrow.
+Will that answer?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, perfectly, perfectly," assented Mr. Illington, much reassured. "We
+are always glad, at the Furmville National, to do the reasonable and
+accommodating thing. Yes; that will be thoroughly satisfactory.&mdash;Ahem!
+I have a new note here. You might sign it? To keep things regular, in
+order."</p>
+
+<p>Withers signed the new note. It was for five days.</p>
+
+<p>Illington got to his feet with stiff dignity.</p>
+
+<p>"Glad to accommodate you, Mr. Withers; very glad. I wish you good
+morning," he concluded, going toward the door.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye," replied Withers absently, but looked up suddenly. "By the
+way, I might like to know something about the disposition of that
+thousand dollars. Could you tell me anything concerning it?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Illington came back to his chair and reseated himself, again
+producing the bulky envelope.</p>
+
+<p>"I was prepared for just such a request, a perfectly natural request," he
+answered Withers question, plainly approving of his own forehandedness.</p>
+
+<p>He took from the envelope and passed to Withers a canceled check.</p>
+
+<p>"This," he said, "gives you the information you desire. You see, I
+gathered from the newspaper reports this morning and from the gossip of
+the street yesterday afternoon that there might be more or less of&mdash;er&mdash;a
+mystery in this&mdash;ah&mdash;distressing situation. Consequently, I brought along
+this check which, curiously enough, had not been called for by the maker
+of it."</p>
+
+<p>Withers, disregarding the banker's remarks, was studying the check. It
+had been signed by Enid Fulton Withers, to whom the $1,000 loan had
+evidently been credited at the Furmville National. It was for $1,000, and
+it was made payable to Maria Fulton. Maria Fulton had indorsed it, and,
+below her endorsement, appeared that of Henry Morley, showing that the
+money had passed directly into the hands of Morley.</p>
+
+<p>"That's all I wanted to know," Withers said quietly, giving the check
+back to Illington. "I'm much obliged."</p>
+
+<p>This time Illington departed, taking himself off with a feeling of having
+done his duty with promptitude and according to the best business ethics.</p>
+
+<p>His visit had prevented Withers' meeting the train, and Fulton had gone
+directly to Manniston Road.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway, going to the hotel on the banker's heels, was admitted by
+Withers, who broke into a storm of futile, highly coloured profanity.</p>
+
+<p>"Brace," he said, "you'll get the devil who's caused all this, won't you?
+You know what my life has been! You'll get him if you have to tear up
+heaven and earth."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure! Sure!" Braceway declared. "Keep yourself together. Let me do the
+worrying. I'll get him if he's above the sod."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>"So, you see," Braceway said, in reciting the incident to Bristow, "we're
+getting a little warm on the scent. This Morley, this wooer of Maria,
+seems to have his head within stinging range of the hornets, doesn't he?"</p>
+
+<p>"Undoubtedly."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you make of it?" pressed Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow thought a little while.</p>
+
+<p>"It might be this," he advanced: "Morley is in trouble with his bank,
+short in his accounts&mdash;probably has been for several months. Two months
+ago, sixty-one days ago, he confided to Miss Fulton that he stood in
+great danger of arrest, pointed out that he had made a mistake, asked
+assistance from her, told her a thousand dollars would arrange things.</p>
+
+<p>"But, instead of paying the thousand into the bank, he went to gambling
+with it in the hope of trebling or quadrupling it and&mdash;lost it. In other
+words, he's been afraid to tell his financ&eacute;e how much he really owed the
+bank and then played the thousand to win enough to enable him to square
+himself."</p>
+
+<p>"Once more," observed the Atlanta man, "you speak in mouthfuls."</p>
+
+<p>"Again and further&mdash;of course, all this is on the theory that Morley is a
+pusillanimous kind of man; but he would have to be just that to be taking
+money from a woman, any woman, much less the one to whom he is engaged to
+be married&mdash;again and further, when he had lost the thousand and saw ruin
+just ahead of him again, he ran down here and asked for more money.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps, Mrs. Withers, at her sister's tearful request, had previously
+raised more than a thousand for him, had added to that thousand other
+money obtained from pawning some of her jewelry; and he now insisted that
+Maria make Mrs. Withers go the limit and pawn <i>all</i> her jewelry.</p>
+
+<p>"By George!" Bristow concluded. "That may explain the quarrel which Miss
+Rutgers, the trained nurse in Number Seven, heard the two sisters engaged
+in the day before the murder. Yes; it might. Evidently, Mrs. Withers
+refused to be bled further. After that, what? What would you say?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's plain enough," Braceway answered. "There was Morley, crazed by the
+fear of arrest and conviction for embezzlement. There was Mrs. Withers,
+still possessing and holding enough jewelry to get him out of trouble, if
+he had time to convert the jewels into cash and to get back to his bank
+with the money.</p>
+
+<p>"What was the result of that situation? Evidently, he never intended to
+catch that midnight train. He did what he had planned to do, came back to
+Number Five, confronted Mrs. Withers soon after her escort had left her
+at the door, demanded the jewels, was refused; and then, in a blind rage
+or a panic, killed her and stole the jewels."</p>
+
+<p>"There's no use blinking the fact," said Bristow in a quiet, calculating
+way, trying to keep in his mind all the other peculiar circumstances
+surrounding this crime. "From the way we've put it, the thing reads as
+plainly as a primer. Now, what are we to do? Even now, we haven't the
+proof on him&mdash;any real proof."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose," said Braceway, "we let him leave Furmville, let him go back
+to Washington, with the hope that he does pawn the stuff he's stolen?"</p>
+
+<p>"And suppose," Bristow added, "we get a detailed description of all the
+jewelry Mrs. Withers owned, and wire that description to the police of
+the principal towns between here and Washington and between here and
+Atlanta. We'll make the request, of course, that they watch the pawnshops
+and nab anybody who shows up with any of the Withers stuff?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's it! That's it as sure as you're born!" Braceway struck the arm of
+his chair and catapulted himself into a standing position. "That will get
+him&mdash;provided, of course, he's desperate enough to take the chance of
+pawning any of it."</p>
+
+<p>"One other thing," Bristow supplemented. "You said Withers said something
+to you this morning about your knowing what his life had been. Just what
+did he mean?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway reflected a moment,</p>
+
+<p>"There's no reason for your not knowing it," he confided. "Withers
+had rather a trying life with his wife. It was a baffling sort of a
+situation. She was in love with him. I haven't a doubt of that. And he
+was in love with her.</p>
+
+<p>"She was one of the most fascinating women I ever saw. They used to say
+in Atlanta that all the women liked her, and that any man who had once
+shaken hands with her and looked her in the eye was, forever after, her
+obedient servant.</p>
+
+<p>"But she was never entirely frank with Withers. Naturally, that at first
+made him regretful, and later it made him jealous. You know his type.
+I'm not sure that I have the whole story, but that's the foundation of
+it, and it led to bitter disagreements and fierce quarrels.</p>
+
+<p>"Some of their acquaintances got on to it, and couldn't understand why a
+woman like her and a good fellow like Withers couldn't hit it off. Things
+got worse and worse. I don't believe Withers minded her being up here
+with her sister. The temporary separation came, probably, as a great
+relief to both of them."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," Bristow said. "Naturally, when, on top of all that, the money
+began to fly and the jewels went into pawn, he came to the end of his
+rope&mdash;determined to put a stop to the thing."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably," said Braceway, looking at his watch. "But how about our
+little job&mdash;getting the description of the jewelry and having Greenleaf
+wire it out? I'll go down to Number Five and get it from Withers and his
+father-in-law."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't mind seeing Miss Fulton?" Bristow asked interestedly.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no," he answered, embarrassment again in his manner. "But I don't
+feel like cross-questioning her. You can understand that. You'll have to
+take on that end, really."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow thought: "He's still in love with her. I was right about her.
+There's a lot to her if she can hold a live wire like this." Aloud he
+said:</p>
+
+<p>"All right. You get the list. In the meantime, I'll telephone Greenleaf
+to tell Morley he can go to Washington tomorrow if he wants to&mdash;but not
+today."</p>
+
+<p>"Why not today?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because there are some things here you and I had better go over, and I
+think we'd do well to follow Morley, don't you? That is, if we want to
+get the goods on him without fail."</p>
+
+<p>"Now that I think of it, yes. Perhaps, both of us needn't go, but one
+will have to."</p>
+
+<p>He went down the steps, saying Withers had by this time arrived at No. 5
+and would be waiting there with Mr. Fulton. Both the father and the
+husband would accompany the body of Mrs. Withers to Atlanta on the four
+o'clock train that afternoon.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, having caught Greenleaf by telephone at the inquest, gave him
+their decision about Morley's departure the next day, and announced that
+he and Braceway would like him to send out by wire the description of the
+Withers jewels. To both of these propositions Greenleaf agreed. Bristow
+returned to his porch.</p>
+
+<p>"So," he thought, "it's got to be Morley or the negro."</p>
+
+<p>And yet, he decided, in spite of the theorizing he and Braceway had
+indulged in, there was small chance now of fixing the crime definitely on
+Morley. He had none of the jewelry, apparently. The police had searched
+his baggage and his room at the hotel, without success. Indubitably, it
+would be more likely that a jury would convict Perry. All the direct
+evidence was against the negro.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow did not deceive himself. It would be a great satisfaction and a
+morsel to his vanity to prove the negro guilty. He foresaw that the
+papers sooner or later would get hold of the fact that Braceway was after
+Morley.</p>
+
+<p>And, although they had hinted at mystery and uncertainty this morning,
+they had printed their stories so as to show that Greenleaf, backed by
+Bristow, would try to get Perry. The duel between himself and Braceway
+was on. He remembered he had discounted at the beginning the idea of the
+negro's guilt, but that had been before the discovery of the fragment of
+the lavalliere chain.</p>
+
+<p>Now, he was disposed, determined even, to treat everything as if Perry
+were the guilty man. He would work with that idea always in mind. In
+the meantime he would go with Braceway as long as the Braceway theories
+seemed to have any foundation at all. He did not want to run the risk of
+being shown up as a bungler. He was anxious to be "in on" anything that
+might happen.</p>
+
+<p>"So," he concluded, "if Perry is finally convicted, I get the credit. If
+Morley is sent up, I'll get some of the credit for that also. I won't
+lose either way.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, about Withers? I've got to handle him by myself. If I were
+analyzing this case from the newspaper accounts of it, I'd say at first
+blush that either Withers did the thing or Perry did it. That's what the
+public's saying now.</p>
+
+<p>"But Braceway stands as a fence between Withers and me. He's a friend of
+Withers and in love with Withers' sister-in-law. And he believes Withers
+innocent. That's patent. For the present, I can't do anything in that
+direction. I've got to dig up everything possible on Morley and the
+negro&mdash;and, in spite of the check business, the chances are against the
+negro."</p>
+
+<p>He called to Mattie whom he heard moving about in the dining room.</p>
+
+<p>"Lucy Thomas," he said, "is out of jail now. I wish you'd go look for her
+right away. The inquest is over by this time, and she'll be at home by
+the time you get there. Bring her back here with you. Tell her it's by
+order of the police, and I only want to talk to her a few minutes."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh," said Mattie.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not going to hurt her, Mattie," he said. "Be sure to tell her so."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh, Mistuh Bristow; I sho' will tell her. I 'spec' dat po' nigger
+is done had de bre'f skeered outen her already."</p>
+
+<p>His eye was caught by the figures of Braceway and Mr. Fulton leaving No.
+5. They turned and started up the walk toward No. 9.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Fulton," Braceway explained, after the introduction to Bristow,
+"wants to tell you something about his&mdash;about Mrs. Withers. It brings in
+further complications&mdash;hard ones for us."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h2>
+
+<h3>THE MAN WITH THE GOLD TOOTH</h3>
+
+
+<p>Mr. Fulton's arms trembled as he put his hands on the arms of a chair and
+seated himself with the deliberateness of his years. In his face the
+lines were still deep, and once or twice his mouth twisted as if with
+actual pain, but there was in his eyes the flame of an indomitable will.
+He was by no means a crushed and weak old man. Neither the terrific blow
+of his daughter's death nor the reverses he had suffered in his business
+affairs had broken him.</p>
+
+<p>"What I have to say," he began, looking first at Braceway and then at
+Bristow, "is not a pleasant story, but it has to be told."</p>
+
+<p>His low-pitched, modulated voice was clear and without a tremor. His
+glance at the two men gave them the impression that he paid them a
+certain tribute.</p>
+
+<p>"Both of you," he continued, "are gentlemen. Mr. Braceway, you're a
+personal friend of my son-in-law. Mr. Bristow, I know you will respect my
+confidence, in so far as it can be respected."</p>
+
+<p>They both bowed assent. At the same moment the telephone rang. Bristow
+excused himself and answered it. The chief of police was on the wire.</p>
+
+<p>"It's all over!" his voice sounded jubilantly. "It's all over, and I want
+you to congratulate me, congratulate me and yourself. It was quick work."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?" queried Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"The inquest is over. The coroner's jury found that Mrs. Withers came to
+her death at the hands of Perry Carpenter."</p>
+
+<p>"And you're satisfied?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, I'm satisfied! We've found the guilty man, and he's under lock and
+key. What more do I want? I'll tell you what, I'll be up to have dinner
+with you in a little while. I invite myself," this with a chuckle. "You
+and I will have a little celebration dinner. It is a go?"</p>
+
+<p>"By all means. I'll be delighted to have you, and I want to hear all
+about the inquest."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow went back to the porch.</p>
+
+<p>"That," he told them, "was a message from the chief of police. He says
+the coroner's jury has held the negro, Perry Carpenter, for the crime."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Fulton moved forward in his chair, his hands clutching the arms of it
+tightly.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll never believe it, never!" he declared, evidently indignant.
+"Nothing will ever persuade me that Enid, Mrs. Withers, met her death at
+the hands of an ordinary negro burglar."</p>
+
+<p>"What makes you so positive of that?" Bristow asked curiously.</p>
+
+<p>"Because of what has happened in the past," Fulton replied with emphasis.
+"I was about to tell you. This man none of you have been able to find,
+this man with the gold tooth, has been in Enid's life for a good many
+years. I don't understand why you haven't found him; I really don't."</p>
+
+<p>"We haven't had two whole days to work on this case yet," Bristow
+reminded him politely. "Many developments may arise."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope so; I hope so," he said sharply. "That man must be found."</p>
+
+<p>"One moment," Braceway put in with characteristic quickness; "how do you
+know he's been in your daughter's life, Mr. Fulton?"</p>
+
+<p>"That goes back to the beginning of my story." He looked out across the
+trees and roofs of the town toward the mountains.</p>
+
+<p>"Enid was always my favourite daughter. I suppose it's a mistake to
+distinguish between one's children, to favour one beyond the other. But
+she was just that&mdash;my favourite daughter&mdash;always. She had a dash, a
+spirit, a joyous soul. Years ago I saw that she would develop into a
+fascinating womanhood.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing disturbed me until she was nineteen. Then she fell in love. It
+was while she was spending a summer at Hot Springs, Virginia. The trouble
+was not in her falling in love. It was that she never told me the name of
+the man she loved." He leaned back again and sighed. "She never did tell
+me. I never knew.</p>
+
+<p>"I never knew, because, when she was twenty, she came to me with the
+unexpected announcement that she was going to marry George Withers.
+I was surprised. She was not the kind to change in her likes and
+dislikes. And I knew Withers was not the man she had originally loved.
+Nevertheless, I asked her no questions, and she was married to Withers
+when she was barely twenty-one.</p>
+
+<p>"A year later, approximately four years ago, she and my other daughter,
+Maria, spent six weeks at Atlantic City in the early spring. It was there
+that she got into trouble. I could detect it in her letters. Some
+tremendous sorrow or difficulty had overtaken her, and she was fighting
+it alone.</p>
+
+<p>"Her husband was not with her. I wrote to Maria asking her to investigate
+quietly, to report to me whether there was anything I could do.</p>
+
+<p>"Maria's report was unsatisfactory. She knew Enid was distressed and was
+giving away or risking in some manner large amounts of money&mdash;even
+pawning her jewelry, jewelry which I had given her and which she prized
+above everything else. The whole thing was a mystery, Maria wrote. The
+very next mail I received a letter from Enid asking me to lend her two
+thousand dollars.</p>
+
+<p>"She made no pretence of explaining why she wanted it. She didn't have to
+explain. I was a rich man at that time, comparatively speaking, and she
+knew I would give her the money.</p>
+
+<p>"I mailed her a check for two thousand, but on the train which carried
+the check I sent a private detective&mdash;not to make any arrests, you
+understand, not to raise any row or start any scandal. I merely wanted to
+find out what or who troubled her. Women, you know, particularly good
+women, are prone to fall into the hands of unscrupulous people.</p>
+
+<p>"Four days later the detective reported to me, but it was of no special
+value. He couldn't tell me where the two thousand had gone. If Enid had
+paid it to a man or a woman, the fellow had missed seeing the
+transaction. With the description of the jewels I had given him, however,
+he made a round of the pawnshops in Atlantic City and learned that all of
+them had been pawned&mdash;for a total of seven thousand."</p>
+
+<p>"Pawned by whom&mdash;herself?" asked Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"No. They were pawned in different shops by a man with a gold tooth and a
+thick, chestnut-brown beard."</p>
+
+<p>"No wonder you doubt the negro's guilt!" exclaimed Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"Excuse me," put in Bristow quickly, "but did you ever mention this to
+Mr. Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly, not," Fulton answered. "I never told it to a living soul. And
+as my inquiries had netted me practically nothing, I was obliged to let
+the matter drop. It was bad enough for me to have interfered with her, my
+daughter and a married woman, in the hope of helping her. Most assuredly,
+I could not have distressed her, degraded her, by telling her a detective
+had been investigating her."</p>
+
+<p>"And that was the end of it?" asked Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"Not quite. She went back to Atlanta. Withers wanted to know where her
+jewels were. She wrote to me in an agony of fear and sorrow, asking me to
+redeem the jewels. I did it. I went to Atlantic City myself. She had sent
+me the tickets. It cost me seven thousand dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"That was four years ago?" Braceway continued the inquiry.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Did Miss Maria Fulton at that time know Henry Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; I think not. I think Morley's been a friend of hers for about three
+years."</p>
+
+<p>The three were silent, each busy with the same thought: that Morley was
+being blamed for a series of acts at this time which duplicated what had
+happened four years ago when he was unknown to the Fulton family, with
+this distinction, that this last time murder had been added to the
+blackmail or whatever it was. And the theory of his guilt was weakened.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Withers has told me," Bristow said, "that there was a repetition of
+the pawning of the jewels in Washington about a year ago."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true," confirmed Fulton. "But on that occasion I knew nothing of
+what had happened until Enid came to me, again with the request that I
+redeem the jewelry. Her husband had arrived in Washington unexpectedly,
+precipitating the crisis. I gave her the money. The sum this time was
+eight thousand dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"And that ended it, Mr. Fulton?"</p>
+
+<p>The old man looked out again toward the mountains as if he sought to gain
+some of their serenity.</p>
+
+<p>"No. That time I asked her what troubled her. I explained that I would
+blame her for nothing, that I only wanted to help her, to give her
+comfort. But she wouldn't tell me anything. She declared that nobody
+could help her and that, anyway, there would never be a repetition of the
+extortion.</p>
+
+<p>"She wept bitterly&mdash;I can hear her weeping now&mdash;and she begged me to
+believe that she had been guilty of nothing&mdash;nothing criminal or immoral.
+I told her I could never believe that of her.</p>
+
+<p>"'It doesn't affect me alone. I'll have to fight it out the best way I
+can,' was all the explanation she could bring herself to give me. The one
+fact she revealed was that the man concerned in the Atlantic City affair
+had also been responsible for her trouble in Washington."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, absorbed in every word of the story, recollected at once that
+Mrs. Allen had received the same explanation when she had tried to
+comfort Mrs. Withers.</p>
+
+<p>"By George!" said Braceway, his voice a little husky. "She was game all
+right&mdash;game to the finish."</p>
+
+<p>"I think," said Fulton, relaxing suddenly so that his whole form seemed
+to sag and grow weak, "that's all I wanted to tell you. It's all I can
+tell&mdash;all I know. I wanted to show you that this man with the gold tooth
+and the brown beard is no myth, as you seem to believe.</p>
+
+<p>"Make no mistake about him, gentlemen. He has ability, ability which he
+uses only for unworthy ends." The old man sucked in his lips and bit on
+them. "He's elusive, slippery, working always in the dark.</p>
+
+<p>"He's low, base. He wouldn't stop at murder. And I'm certain he was
+the principal figure in my daughter's death. Nothing&mdash;no power on
+earth&mdash;nobody can ever make me believe that Enid was murdered by the
+negro. It doesn't fit in with what has gone before."</p>
+
+<p>"If there's any way to find this man, we'll do it," Bristow assured him.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway sprang to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"You can bet your last dollar on that, Mr. Fulton," he said heartily, "If
+he's to be found, we'll get him."</p>
+
+<p>The old man got to his feet. The recital of his story had weakened him.
+His legs were a little unsteady. Braceway took him by the arm, and they
+started down the steps.</p>
+
+<p>"Will I see you again this afternoon?" Bristow called to the Atlanta
+detective.</p>
+
+<p>"I rather think so," Braceway threw back over his shoulder. "As soon as
+I've had lunch I want to talk to Abrahamson. Chief Greenleaf seems to
+have neglected him."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow hesitated a moment, then limped down the steps.</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon, Mr. Fulton," he said, overtaking the two, "but is
+there nothing more, no hint, no probable clue, you can give us about this
+mysterious man?"</p>
+
+<p>"Absolutely nothing," Fulton answered wearily. "I've told you all I
+know."</p>
+
+<p>"You gave him&mdash;rather, you gave your daughter for him a total of
+seventeen thousand dollars, counting the loan of two thousand and the
+cost of redeeming the jewels both times. I beg your pardon for seeming
+insistent, but is it possible that you passed over that much money
+without even asking why she had been obliged to use it? Not many people
+would credit such a thing."</p>
+
+<p>Fulton smiled, and for a moment his grief seemed lightened by the hint of
+happy memories.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, you didn't know my daughter, sir," he said. "She was irresistible,
+not to be denied&mdash;one of the ardent flames of life. If she had asked me,
+I would have given her treble that amount&mdash;anything, anything, sir."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow thought of what had been said of her in Atlanta: that all women
+liked her and that any man who had shaken hands with her was her
+unquestioning servant. Surely such a woman would have been irresistible
+in her requests to her father.</p>
+
+<p>He ventured another line of inquiry:</p>
+
+<p>"When you arrived at Number Five this morning, I was in the living room,
+and I saw the meeting between you and Miss Maria Fulton. I came away as
+soon as I could, but I couldn't help noting your expression as you
+greeted her. It seemed to me that there was accusation in it."</p>
+
+<p>"There was," the old man assented. "Enid had written me that Maria had
+been pressing her for money, too much money. Naturally, when I heard of
+the&mdash;the tragedy, I coupled it with the old, old thing that had always
+been a burden on Enid&mdash;money. And this time I blamed Maria. Of course,
+however, that was a mistake."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," said Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>He returned to his porch and sat down. He went over all that the father
+of the dead woman had told him. So far as he could see, it had only
+served the purpose of strengthening the case against Morley. Let it be
+discovered that Maria had known Morley at the time of the Atlantic City
+affair, and the case would be fixed, irrefutable. And Braceway would
+win out.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, there was still one chance. There was the bare possibility
+that Morley had gone to No. 5 to murder Enid if he did not get more money
+from her, and that he had been frustrated by the fact that the negro
+Perry had forestalled him and done the murder first. Having advanced it,
+Bristow did not care to abandon the theory that Perry was the guilty man.</p>
+
+<p>An automobile whirled up Manniston Road and stopped in front of No. 9.
+His physician, Dr. Mowbray, sprang from the car and up the steps.</p>
+
+<p>"Good morning, doctor!" the patient called out cheerily.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello!" answered Mowbray crustily. "But what's the big idea in your
+trying to do a Sherlock Holmes in this murder case?"</p>
+
+<p>The doctor was overbearing and opinionated. He had many patients, who
+were in the habit of knotowing to him and obeying his instructions
+implicitly. It was something which he required.</p>
+
+<p>"Sit down," invited Bristow. "I'm not doing any Sherlock Holmes stuff,
+but I thought I ought to help out if I could."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you can't!" snapped Mowbray, with quick, nervous gestures. "You'll
+be in your grave before you know it. You can't stand this." He shot out
+his hand and produced his watch with the celerity of a sleight-of-hand
+performer. "Let me feel your pulse."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow surrendered his wrist to the professional fingers.</p>
+
+<p>"Just what I thought&mdash;twenty beats too fast. And your respiration's a
+crime. Have you had any rest at all, today or yesterday?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not much, doctor."</p>
+
+<p>Mowbray glowered at him.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you'll have to have it! You ought to be in bed this minute. If you
+don't carry out my instructions, I'll drop the case. You know that."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry, doctor, but I can't spend my time in bed now," Bristow said
+as persuasively as he could.</p>
+
+<p>"I'd like to know why! Why? Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to Washington tomorrow, although that's a secret. I merely
+confide it to you in a professional way, and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Going to Washington! Man, you're mad&mdash;mad! You'll have a hemorrhage or
+something, and die&mdash;die, I tell you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Nevertheless," Bristow insisted, "I must go."</p>
+
+<p>"About this murder?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well!" snorted Mowbray, rising like a jumping-jack. "Go&mdash;go to the
+North Pole if you wish. I'm through! I can't treat a man who defies my
+orders and advice. Good morning, sir."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow gave him no answer, and he ran down the steps and threw himself
+into his car.</p>
+
+<p>"Mistuh Bristow, Lucy's done come," said Mattie, at the living room door.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow started to leave his chair, but changed his mind.</p>
+
+<p>"Tell her to wait a few minutes," he said.</p>
+
+<p>He began to think and to determine just what he wanted to find out from
+Lucy, what she would say and what he wanted her to say. It would not do
+to question her before he felt sure of what she knew and what she must
+confess. He rocked gently in his chair, going over several times the
+evidence he desired. His face was hard-set, almost like marble, as he
+stared at the mountains. He was thinking harder at that moment than he
+had done at any time since the murder.</p>
+
+<p>He had it now. She had given Perry the key to the Withers kitchen&mdash;or,
+better still, Perry had taken it from her&mdash;and she remembered every
+detail of it, his departure from her house and his return with the key.
+That was what she had to confess. Inevitably, he argued, that would be
+her story, or else she would have no story at all.</p>
+
+<p>He thought of Braceway. He made now no secret of the fact that a struggle
+between himself and the Atlanta man was on&mdash;not openly, but thoroughly
+understood by both of them&mdash;a fight for supremacy, a contest in which he
+sought to convict Perry while Braceway worked for the conviction of
+Morley.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway had the added incentive of wanting to run down the man who had
+destroyed his friend's home life; and Braceway believed that Morley and
+Morley's money entanglements had, in some way, caused the tragedy.</p>
+
+<p>Well, he, Bristow, would see about that! He knew he had the best of the
+argument so far&mdash;and he looked forward to a double pleasure: the applause
+that would come to him as the result of Perry's conviction, and his own
+personal gratification at besting Braceway at his own game.</p>
+
+<p>He went into the unused bedroom and told Mattie to send Lucy Thomas to
+him there. While he waited, he closed the two windows.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h2>
+
+<h3>LUCY THOMAS TALKS</h3>
+
+
+<p>Lucy came slowly into the room and stood near the door. She was of the
+peculiar-looking negress type sometimes seen in the South&mdash;light of
+complexion, with hard, porcelain-like blue eyes and kinky hair which,
+instead of being black, is brown or brownish red. After her first
+startled glance toward Bristow she stood with her head lowered and with
+an expression of sulky stubbornness.</p>
+
+<p>"Sit down!" he ordered after a few moments' silence, indicating a chair
+near the wall.</p>
+
+<p>She took her seat while he stepped to the door and closed it.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Lucy," he said, pulling at his lower lip as he stood in the middle
+of the room and looked down at her, "I'm not going to hurt you, and
+there's nothing for you to be afraid of. All I want you to do is to tell
+me the truth."</p>
+
+<p>In spite of his reassuring words, the woman caught the full meaning of
+the goading sharpness in his voice. She immediately became more sullen.</p>
+
+<p>"'Deed, I ain' got nothin' to tell 'bout you white folks," she said, with
+a touch of insolence.</p>
+
+<p>"This isn't about white folks," he corrected her, resisting his quick
+impulse to anger. "It's about coloured folks."</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin' 'bout dem neithuh," she continued in the same tone. "I don' know
+nothin' 'cep'n I wuz drunk. I done tole all dat down at de p'lice
+station."</p>
+
+<p>"Listen to me!" he commanded, a little pale, "You know perfectly well
+what I want to find out. I want you to tell me everything you remember
+about Perry Carpenter's actions and words last Monday night&mdash;the night
+before last."</p>
+
+<p>She raised and lowered her eyes rapidly, the lids working like the
+shutter of a camera.</p>
+
+<p>"I knows what you wants, an' I knows I don' know nothin' 'tall 'bout it,"
+she objected, her sullenness a patent defiance.</p>
+
+<p>He stared at her for a full two minutes. She could hear the breath
+whistling between his teeth; the sound of it frightened her.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't lie to me!" he said, now a trifle hoarse. "It isn't necessary, and
+it doesn't do anybody any good&mdash;you or Perry either."</p>
+
+<p>She began to whimper.</p>
+
+<p>Looking at her, he was conscious of being absorbed in the attempt to keep
+his temper instead of eliciting what she had to tell. He smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"Stop that sniffling, and tell me what you know about Monday night! Don't
+you remember that Perry told you he was going to Mrs. Withers' house and
+steal her jewelry?"</p>
+
+<p>"I done tole you I don' remembuh nothin'."</p>
+
+<p>He took a step toward her and lifted his open hand as if to strike her in
+the face. Without waiting for the blow, she slid from the chair and fell
+sprawling to the floor, where she lay, moaning.</p>
+
+<p>"Get up!"</p>
+
+<p>She obeyed him, her arms held folded over her head as a shield against
+expected blows. She was still sullen, uncommunicative, her head down.</p>
+
+<p>He limped swiftly to the door, left the room and went to the front part
+of the house. He paced the length of the living room several times, his
+fists clenched, his protuberant lip grown heavier.</p>
+
+<p>He called to Mattie, who was in the kitchen.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish," he directed, "you'd go down to Sterrett's and get a dozen
+oranges."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, suh. Right now, Mistuh Bristow?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; hurry. I want some orangeade."</p>
+
+<p>He returned to the bedroom and closed the door. Lucy was bent forward on
+the chair, moaning.</p>
+
+<p>"Stop that!" he said, feeling now that he had himself and her under
+control. "If you don't stop, you'll have something real to sniffle about
+before I'm through with you! Now begin. What about Perry last Monday
+night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Please, suh," she changed her tone, "lemme go. I ain' got nothin' to
+say. I feels like I might say somethin' dat ain' so. I'se kinder skeered
+you might make me say somethin' whut I don' mean to say."</p>
+
+<p>Moving deliberately, a fine, little tremor in his fingers, he took off
+his coat and vest and hung them on the back of a chair. He had just
+noticed that it was warm and close in the shut-up room. There was a
+ringing in his ears. He kept repeating to himself that, if he lost his
+temper, she would never become communicative.</p>
+
+<p>He began all over again, patient, persistent&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>When Mattie came back with the oranges, she met Lucy just outside the
+kitchen door. There were no tears in the Thomas woman's eyes, but she
+seemed greatly distressed.</p>
+
+<p>"Whut'd he want offen you?" Mattie asked, with the negro's usual
+curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin' much," replied the other, looking blankly out across Mattie's
+shoulder. "He jes' axed me whut I knowd 'bout Perry dat night."</p>
+
+<p>"I tole you dar warn't nothin' to be skeered uv him foh," said Mattie.
+"Some uv you niggers ain' got no sense."</p>
+
+<p>"Yas; dat's so," Lucy agreed dully, and walked slowly away.</p>
+
+<p>She moved as if she felt that there was something frightful behind her.
+When she was half-way home, she broke into a run, and, moaning, ran the
+remainder of the distance. She threw herself on her bed and sobbed a long
+time.</p>
+
+<p>She had talked, and for the present she thought she felt more sorry for
+Perry than she did for herself.</p>
+
+<p>In the meantime, Bristow had gone into the bathroom to wash his hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Pah!" he exclaimed, disgusted.</p>
+
+<p>He dried his hands and walked, whistling, out to the living room. No
+matter how distasteful the scene with the sullen woman had been, the
+substantial fact remained that he had in his pocket an important
+document. After all, Lucy Thomas had talked&mdash;and signed.</p>
+
+<p>"Mattie," he called, "fix me an orangeade, please. Mr. Greenleaf's late
+for dinner, and I need a little freshening up."</p>
+
+<p>He went to the living room window again and gazed, with thoughtful,
+slightly sad eyes, out toward the mountains.</p>
+
+<p>"These policemen!" he was thinking contemptuously. "They don't know how
+to make blockheads tell what they can tell. There are ways&mdash;and ways."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PAWN BROKER TAKES THE TRAIL</h3>
+
+
+<p>Frank Abrahamson, pawn broker and junk dealer, responded at once to
+Braceway's warm smile. The Jew had his racial respect for keenness and
+clean-cut ability. He liked this man who, dressed like a dandy, spoke
+with the air of authority.</p>
+
+<p>"The fellow with the gold tooth?" he replied to Braceway's request for
+information. "Was there anything peculiar about him? Why, yes. He was
+clothed in peculiarities."</p>
+
+<p>The pawn broker, thin, round-shouldered, with a great hook-nose and
+cavernous, bright eyes, spoke rapidly, without an accent, punctuating his
+sentences with thrusts and dartings and waves of his two hands. His
+fifty-five years had not lessened his vitality.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Mr. Braceway, we pawn brokers, we have to observe our
+customers. We become judges of human nature. At the best, we have a hard
+time making a living." Somehow, with his smile, he discounted this
+statement. "And we come to judge men as closely as we examine jewels and
+precious metals. You see?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway saw. He lit a cigarette and stepped to the door to throw away
+the match. The Jew appreciated the thoughtfulness. Trash on the floor
+made the morning task of sweeping up harder.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," continued Abrahamson, expressing with one movement of his arm
+tolerant ridicule, "this man with the gold tooth and the brown beard&mdash;he
+thought he was disguised. By gracious! it was funny. A fellow like me
+takes one look at him and sees the disguise. The gold tooth&mdash;that was
+false, fake. When he talked to me, it was all I could do to keep from
+reaching across the counter and pushing that tooth more firmly into his
+jaw. Gold is heavy, you see. I was afraid it might drop down on my
+showcase and break some glass."</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson laughed. So did Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"And his beard, Mr. Braceway? That was better. To the ordinary
+observer, it might have looked natural&mdash;but not to me. Oh, yes; he was
+disguised&mdash;too much.&mdash;Besides, the other afternoon was not the first time
+I had seen him&mdash;no."</p>
+
+<p>"You saw him two months ago, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir&mdash;two months ago, and one month before that."</p>
+
+<p>"In here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"What did he want?"</p>
+
+<p>"Money. Money for jewelry. Oh, he had the jewelry. And I gave him the
+money&mdash;a great deal; more, perhaps, than was good for me, when you
+remember I always try to make a reasonable profit. He argued. He knew
+about values."</p>
+
+<p>This interested Braceway more than anything he had yet heard.</p>
+
+<p>"That gave you an idea," he suggested.</p>
+
+<p>"You are quick, Mr. Braceway. It did give me an idea. It made me think:
+well! This man, he has pawned things before, these very same things.
+He knew quite well what they should bring." Abrahamson shrugged his
+shoulders. "And he did know&mdash;and I let him have the money. That is, I
+mean, what happened the first two times. This last time, the three days
+ago, he was different, in a hurry, and he took only what I offered. He
+made no argument. I could see he was frightened. Yes&mdash;he was different
+this last time."</p>
+
+<p>The detective, oblivious of the other for a moment, blew a cloud of smoke
+across the counter, causing the Jew to dodge and cough.</p>
+
+<p>"Let me see," Braceway said. "You saw him three months ago, two months
+ago, and three days ago. Had you ever seen him before?"</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson laughed, and, reaching over, slapped Braceway on the shoulder
+gently.</p>
+
+<p>"You are so quick, Mr. Braceway! I can't swear I had ever seen him
+before, but I think I had&mdash;not with the gold tooth and the beard, but
+with a moustache and bushy eyebrows, eyebrows too bushy."</p>
+
+<p>"Where? Where did you see him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Here, I think&mdash;but I'm not sure, you see. Sometimes I have traveled a
+little&mdash;to Atlanta, to Washington, to New York. I don't know; I can't
+tell whether I saw him in one of those places, or some other place, or
+here."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway urged him with his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"If you only could! Mr. Abrahamson, if you could remember where you saw
+him when he wore the moustache, you would enable me to put my hands on
+him. You'd do more. You'd give me enough information to lead to the
+arrest of the murderer."</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson was silent, gazing through the shop doorway. He turned to the
+detective again.</p>
+
+<p>"I bet you, Mr. Braceway, you will be glad to hear something. Chief
+Greenleaf was in here this morning, asking questions. But he asked so
+many that were worth nothing, so few that were good. And I forgot to tell
+him the whole story&mdash;the things of, perhaps, significance."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me. Significance is what I'm after."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you know Mr. Withers spent almost the whole day in here before the
+night of the murder. Once he went out. That was in the late afternoon to
+get some lunch. While he was out&mdash;understand, while he was out&mdash;in came
+the gold-tooth fellow.</p>
+
+<p>"It was bad luck. I kept him as long as I could, but he was hurried,
+nervous. Half an hour, forty minutes maybe, after the gold-tooth fellow
+had gone, in came Withers again, out of breath, complaining that he had
+picked the man up just outside here and followed him, only to lose him
+when the gold-tooth fellow went through Casey's store to the avenue.</p>
+
+<p>"I showed Withers the ring the fellow had pawned for a hundred dollars.</p>
+
+<p>"'Yes, yes!' he said; 'that's one of my wife's rings.'</p>
+
+<p>"And he was all cut up.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, here is what I have to tell." Abrahamson lowered his voice and,
+leaning low on his elbow, thrust his face far over the counter toward
+Braceway. "It is only an idea, but&mdash;it is an idea. I bet you I would not
+tell anybody else. Such things might get a man into trouble. But I like
+you, Mr. Braceway. I confide in you. Mr. Withers and that man with the
+beard and the gold tooth&mdash;something in the look of the eyes, something
+in the build of the shoulders&mdash;each reminded me of the other, a little.
+And they were at no time in here together. Just an idea, I told you.
+But&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He spread out his hands, straightened his back, and smiled.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway was, undisguisedly, amazed.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean Withers was the&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"S&mdash;sh&mdash;sh!" Abrahamson held up a protesting hand. "Not so loud, Mr.
+Braceway. It is just an idea for you to think over. I study faces,
+and all that sort of thing, and ideas sometimes are valuable&mdash;sometimes
+not."</p>
+
+<p>"By George!" Braceway put into his expression an enthusiasm he was far
+from feeling. "You've done me a service, a tremendous service, Mr.
+Abrahamson."</p>
+
+<p>He thought rapidly. Three months ago! Where had George Withers been then?
+Three months ago was the first of February. He started. It was then that
+Withers had gone to Savannah. At least, he had said he was going to
+Savannah. And two months ago? He was not certain, but when had George
+left Atlanta, ostensibly for Memphis?</p>
+
+<p>Inwardly, the detective ridiculed himself. He would have sworn to the
+innocence of Withers. In fact, he was swearing to it all over again as
+he stood there in the pawnshop. Abrahamson's "idea" was out of the
+question. People were often victims of "wild thinking" in the midst of
+the excitement caused by a murder mystery.</p>
+
+<p>He returned to the effort to persuade the Jew to try to remember where he
+had seen the bearded man without a beard, with only a moustache and bushy
+eyebrows.</p>
+
+<p>"That's the important thing," he urged. "If you can remember that, I'll
+land the murderer."</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe&mdash;perhaps, I can." The pawn broker hesitated, then made up his mind
+to confide to Braceway another secret. "I don't promise, but there is a
+chance. You see, Mr. Braceway, I'm a thinker." He smiled, deprecating the
+statement. "Most men do not think. But me, I think. I do this: I want to
+remember something. Good! I go back into my little room back of the shop,
+and I practise association of ideas. What does the moustache remind me
+of? What was in his voice that made me think I had seen him before? What
+do his eyes bring up in my mind?</p>
+
+<p>"So! I go back over the months, over the years. One idea leads to another
+connected with it. There flash into my mind links and links of thoughts
+until I have a chain leading to&mdash;where? Somewhere. It is fun&mdash;and it
+brings the results. I will do so tonight and tomorrow. I will try. I
+bet you I will be able to tell you&mdash;finally. You see?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's a great scheme," said Braceway, encouraging him. "It ought to work.
+Now, tell me this: how did this fellow strike you? What did you think of
+him when he was in here pawning jewels and wearing a disguise?"</p>
+
+<p>"I will tell you the truth. I thought at first he was like a lot of other
+sick people who come here with that disease&mdash;tuberculosis. In the
+beginning they have plenty of money. They expect to get well before the
+money gives out. But they have miscalculated. They are not yet well, and
+the money is gone.</p>
+
+<p>"What next? They must have more money. With this disease, the rich get
+well, the poor die. Well! I thought this fellow needed money to get
+well&mdash;that was all; and, like a lot of them, he was ashamed of being hard
+up and didn't want it known."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me this: would the ordinary man in the street have noticed that the
+gold tooth was a false, clumsy affair?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think not. I buy all sorts of old gold and sets of false teeth. There
+is a market for them. I have studied them. That's why I saw what this
+fellow's was."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Now, will you show me what he pawned two months ago, and three
+months ago?"</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson consulted a big book, went to the safe at the back of the
+shop, and returned with two little packets. In the first were two
+bracelets, one studded with emeralds and diamonds, the other set with
+rubies. In the second envelope was a gold ring set with one large diamond
+surrounded by small rubies.</p>
+
+<p>"I allowed him six hundred dollars on the bracelets," explained
+Abrahamson; "they are handsome&mdash;exquisite; and three hundred and fifty
+on the ring."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway passed the stuff back to him. It was a part of the Withers
+jewelry.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Mr. Braceway," added the Jew, "all this business, this murder
+and everything, will cost me money. This jewelry, it is stolen goods.
+Chief Greenleaf leaves it here for the present, as a decoy. Perhaps,
+somebody might try to reclaim it. That's what he thinks. As for me, I
+don't think so. It is a dead loss."</p>
+
+<p>He sighed and rearranged the articles in their envelopes.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," agreed the detective; "it's hard luck. You've got every reason to
+be interested in running down the truth in this mix-up. I wish you could
+tell me where you think you saw this man&mdash;the time he had neither the
+gold tooth nor the brown beard."</p>
+
+<p>"Be patient, my friend&mdash;Mr. Braceway. By tomorrow I may remember. I shall
+work hard&mdash;the association of ideas! It is a great system."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway thanked him and was about to leave the shop. He had already
+formed a new plan. He turned back to the pawn broker.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way," he said, "I'm going to Washington tomorrow. If you should
+remember, if the association of ideas produces anything, I wonder if
+you'd wire me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly. Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>The detective wrote on a slip of paper: S. S. Braceway, Willard Hotel. He
+handed it to Abrahamson.</p>
+
+<p>"Wire me that address, collect," he directed.</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson promised, smiling. He was pleased with the idea of helping to
+solve the problem which convulsed Furmville.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," added Braceway, "another thing. How would you describe this fellow
+in addition to the fact that he wore the beard and the gold tooth?"</p>
+
+<p>"Very thin lips," replied Abrahamson slowly, "and high, straight,
+aquiline nose, and blond hair, and&mdash;and, I should say, rather thin, high
+voice."</p>
+
+<p>"Good!" Braceway exclaimed. "Good! Mr. Abrahamson, you've just described
+the man who, I believe, committed the murder. And I know where he is."</p>
+
+<p>Morley had been pointed out to him in the hotel earlier in the day, and
+Abrahamson's memory sketched a fairly good likeness of the young man as
+he remembered him. Why not make certain of it at once?</p>
+
+<p>"You've been very obliging," he continued, "and, I suppose, that's why I
+feel I can impose on you further. I confide in you, as you did in me. I'm
+going back to the Brevord now. Could you follow me and take a look at a
+man who'll be with me there?"</p>
+
+<p>The Jew's eyes sparkled.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Mr. Braceway," he said and added: "It may cost me money, closing up
+the shop, you understand. But if I can help&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't misunderstand me," the detective cautioned. "There's no charge of
+murder. Nothing like that. This fellow may be the gold-tooth man, and
+still not be the guilty man."</p>
+
+<p>"I see; I see," Abrahamson's tone was one of importance. "You go on, Mr.
+Braceway. I'll follow in three minutes."</p>
+
+<p>"If the man I'm with is the one who wore the disguise, if he looks more
+like it than Mr. Withers did, make no sign. If he's not the fellow
+communicate with me later&mdash;as soon as you can."</p>
+
+<p>Morley was the first person Braceway saw when he entered the lobby of the
+hotel. He lost no time, but crossed over to the leather settee on which
+the young man sat. Morley looked haggard and frightened, and, although he
+held a newspaper in front of him, was gazing into space.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway decided to "take a chance." He had a great respect for his
+intuitions. These "hunches," he had found, were sometimes of no value,
+but they had helped him often enough to make the ideas that came to him
+in this way worth trying. He introduced himself.</p>
+
+<p>"I was wondering," he said, sitting down beside Morley, "if you couldn't
+help me out in a little matter."</p>
+
+<p>Morley sighed and put down his paper before he answered:</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Something about make-ups&mdash;facial make-up."</p>
+
+<p>Morley looked at him and felt that the detective's eyes bored into him.</p>
+
+<p>"What about make-up?"</p>
+
+<p>"I had the idea&mdash;perhaps I got it from George Withers&mdash;that you used to
+be interested in a matter of theatricals."</p>
+
+<p>Morley coloured.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. That is," he qualified, "I was a member of the dramatic club when
+I was in college, University of Pennsylvania. But I didn't know Withers
+knew anything about it."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway's demeanour now was casual. His eyes were no longer on Morley.
+He was watching Abrahamson, who was at the news-stand near the main
+entrance.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought George had mentioned it to me, but I may be mistaken. Did you
+ever 'make up' with a beard?"</p>
+
+<p>The morning papers had got hold of the suspicion of some of the
+authorities that a man wearing a brown beard and a gold tooth was wanted
+because of the murder of Mrs. Withers. Although Chief Greenleaf had tried
+to keep it quiet, it had leaked out as a result of Jenkins' search for
+traces of the man. Morley had read all this, and Braceway's question
+upset him.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he answered; "I never did. I played women's parts."</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson was shaking his head in negation. He made it plain that he saw
+in Morley no resemblance to the man who had come disguised to the
+pawnshop.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway did not press Morley for further information.</p>
+
+<p>"Then you can't help me," he laughed lightly. "Women don't wear beards."</p>
+
+<p>He got up with a careless word about the hot weather and passed on to the
+clerk's desk. He was thinking: "He was lying. Any college annual prints
+the cast of the important 'show' given by the dramatic club that year.
+I'll wire Philadelphia."</p>
+
+<p>He found the manager of the Brevord and inquired:</p>
+
+<p>"How about the bellboy who was on duty all Monday night, Mr. Keene?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's in the house now," Keene informed him. "Roddy is his name."</p>
+
+<p>"Send him up to my room, will you?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway stepped into the elevator. Five minutes after he had
+disappeared, Morley went into the writing room. His hand trembled a
+little as he picked up a pen. He put two or three lines on several sheets
+of paper, one after the other, and tore up all of them.</p>
+
+<p>The communication which he finally completed he put into an envelope and
+addressed to Braceway. It read:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Dear Mr. Braceway: When you asked me about the make-up, I was thinking
+of something else and was not quite clear as to what you were saying or
+what you wanted to know. I remember now that, on one occasion, I did have
+a part as a man who wore a beard in a play given by my college dramatic
+club. However, I don't remember enough about it to pass as an expert on
+such make-ups.</p>
+
+<p>"Yours truly,</p>
+
+<p>"Henry Morley."</p></div>
+
+<p>Going to the desk, he left the note for the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a fool," he reflected, as he went to the door and looked out at the
+traffic in the street. "I believe I'll get a lawyer."</p>
+
+<p>He considered this for a while.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, what's the use? He'll ask me a lot of questions, and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He shuddered and turned back into the lobby, hesitant and wretched.</p>
+
+<p>"My God!" he thought miserably. "I've got to get back to Washington! I've
+got to! After that, I can think&mdash;think!"</p>
+
+<p>But he believed he could not go until the chief of police gave him
+permission. If he had consulted a lawyer, he might have found out
+differently. As it was, he stayed on, thinking more and more
+disconnectedly, eating nothing, his nerves wearing to raw ends.</p>
+
+<p>Upstairs Braceway was strengthening the net he had already woven around
+Henry Morley.</p>
+
+<p>"I was right." He reviewed what he had learned from Abrahamson. "It's
+still up to Morley. That pawn broker's off, 'way off. He thinks George
+Withers resembles the man with the beard, and, although he gave me the
+description that fitted Morley exactly, he takes a look at him and denies
+emphatically that Morley resembles at all the fellow with the disguise."</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson, however, was not satisfied with what he had seen. Back in
+front of his shop, he opened the door, took down the sign he had left
+hanging on the knob, "Back in ten minutes," substituted another, "Closed
+for the day," relocked the door, and started off in the direction of
+Casey's department store.</p>
+
+<p>He had decided to devote the whole afternoon to detective work. Of
+course, it would cost him money, having the shop closed half a day.
+"But," he consoled himself, "I'm worth seventy thousand dollars. I bet
+I am entitled to a little holiday."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV</h2>
+
+<h3>BRACEWAY SEES A LIGHT</h3>
+
+
+<p>Braceway had discovered long ago that the man who attempts good work as a
+detective must depend almost as much on his ability to make friends as he
+does on his capacity for sifting evidence.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a good worker," he was in the habit of saying, "but I'm not half as
+good working alone as I am when I have the help of all the men and women
+who are witnesses in a case or connected with it in some other way. I
+need all the cooperation I can get."</p>
+
+<p>This was one reason why Roddy, when he entered Braceway's room, felt sure
+immediately that he would receive only kindly treatment. He had shown
+signs of fear on entering the room, and in his extremely black face his
+singularly white eyeballs had rolled around grotesquely.</p>
+
+<p>But Braceway put him at ease with a smile.</p>
+
+<p>"What have you been trying to do, Roddy?" was his first good-humoured
+question. "Think you've got sense enough to fool all the white folks?"</p>
+
+<p>"Who, boss? Me, boss?" the boy returned, disavowing with a grin any
+pretense to intelligence. "Naw, suh, boss. You knows I ain' got no sense.
+I ain' nevuh tried to fool nobody."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you tell the chief of police you were awake all of Monday night
+when you were on duty in the lobby and didn't you say the only thing you
+did was to carry up Mr. Morley's bags?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh, boss; an' dat was de truth&mdash;nothin' but de truth, boss. Gawd
+knows&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway took from his pocket a crisp, new one-dollar bill and smoothed
+it out on his knee.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, listen to me, Roddy," he said, this time unsmiling. "Mr. Keene has
+just told me he wouldn't fire you, even if you did go to sleep Monday
+night. There's nothing for you to be afraid of; and this dollar note is
+yours as soon as you tell me the truth, the real truth, about what you
+saw and what you missed seeing Monday night. If you don't tell me, I'll
+have you arrested."</p>
+
+<p>Roddy's eyes, which had shone with a rather greasy glitter at the sight
+of the money, rolled rapidly and whitely in their sockets at the mention
+of arrest.</p>
+
+<p>"'Deed, boss, you ain' gwine to have no cause to 'res' me, no cause
+whatsomever. You knows how 'tis, boss. Us coloured folks, we got a gif,
+jes' a natchel gif', foh nappin' an' sleepin'. Boss, dar ain' no nigger
+in dis town whut would have kep' wide awake&mdash;<i>wide</i>&mdash;all dat Monday night
+nor any yuther night."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well. Think now. Try to remember. Were you asleep at all before
+midnight?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh, boss. Naw, suh!"</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all?"</p>
+
+<p>Roddy began to wilt again.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it might uv been dis way, boss, possibilly. 'Long 'bout 'leven I
+kinder remembuhs jes' a sort uv nap, mo' like a slip, boss." He coughed
+and spoke desperately: "You see, boss, when it gits a little quiet at
+night, seems to me, why, right den, ev'y nigger I knows is got a hinge in
+his neck. 'Pears like he jes' gotter let his haid drap furward. Dar ain'
+no use talkin', boss, dat hinge wuks ovuhtime. I 'spec' mine done it,
+too, jes' like you say, 'long 'bout 'leven. Yas, suh, I reckon dat's
+right."</p>
+
+<p>"How about the time between midnight and two in the morning? Was the
+hinge working then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Aw, boss," replied Roddy with something like reproach, "you knows 'tain'
+no queshun uv a hinge arftuh midnight. Arftuh midnight, boss, de screws
+drap right outen' de hinge, an' dar ain' no mo' hinge. You jes' natchelly
+keeps your haid down an' don' lif' it no mo'. Naw, suh, dar ain' no hinge
+to he'p you dat late, <i>on</i>less&mdash;<i>on</i>less somebody hit you or stab you."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway became stern. His eyes snapped.</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you carry Mr. Morley's grips up to his room for him that night,
+room number four hundred and twenty-one?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh."</p>
+
+<p>"What time was that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dat wuz jes' five minutes arftuh two, boss."</p>
+
+<p>"Had you been asleep during the two hours before that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I hates to say it, boss, but I wuz, almos' completely."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, how did you wake yourself up thoroughly enough to know that it was
+exactly five minutes past two?"</p>
+
+<p>"Lemme see, suh. Possibilly, 'twuz bekase uv whut I seen 'long about
+ha'fpas' one&mdash;possibilly, boss."</p>
+
+<p>"So you hadn't been asleep for two hours?"</p>
+
+<p>"Almos', suh. It wuz dis way: you see, boss, de bellboys' bench is right
+unduh de big clock in de lobby, off to de right uv de desk. I happen' dat
+night to let my haid slide ovuh 'g'in de glass case uv de clock, an when
+it stahted out to hit de ha'fpas' bell, it rattled an' whizzed, an' it
+jarred me. Golly, boss! I woke up an', when I seed how it wuz rainin'
+outside, I thought lightnin' had hit me. It skeered me&mdash;an' dat is one
+good way to wake up a nigger at night&mdash;skeer 'im, an' you don' have to
+stab him. I sorter hollered.</p>
+
+<p>"I got up an' went to de main entrance, jes' to make de night clerk think
+I wuz on de job in case he woke up. I looked down de street tow'rd de
+post-office, an' I seed a man goin' in dar.</p>
+
+<p>"'Bless de Lawd!' I says to myse'f. 'White people ain' got much to
+do&mdash;goin' to de post-office dis time uv night.' An' I went on back to de
+bellboys' bench and stahted in niggerin' it once mo'e."</p>
+
+<p>"Niggering it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, boss; you know, dat means quick sleepin'. 'Peared to me I ain' no
+mo'e got my eyes shut when I wakes up ag'in, an' right dar in de lobby is
+dat same man what I seed gwine to de post-office."</p>
+
+<p>"What waked you up?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don' know, boss. I can' no mo'e figger dat out den I kin fly. Dat wuz
+de fust time in my life dat I done wake up at night when onmolested."</p>
+
+<p>"How did you know the man you saw in the lobby was the one you had seen
+going into the post-office?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dey wuz de same, boss; dat's all. Had de same buil', same long raincoat
+on, an' same thick beard. He had done pass' me by an' wuz on his way up
+de stairs 'stead uv waitin' foh me to run de elevatuh. I wouldn' nevuh
+seed his beard dat time, but he turn' 'roun' when he wuz nigh to de top
+uv de stairs an' look back at me. Den I seed foh a fac' dat he wuz de
+same as de yuther man I jes' done seed."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway gave no sign of how highly he valued the negro's words. Seated
+by the window, the dollar bill still on his knee, he kept his gaze on
+Roddy, holding him to his narrative.</p>
+
+<p>"You want me to believe that, when you saw this man two blocks away at
+half-past one in the morning, you noticed he wore a beard? Wasn't it
+too dark?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh. Dem post-office lights is pow'ful, boss. I seed de beard all
+right, an' I seed it once mo'e when he wuz on de stairs."</p>
+
+<p>"What did he do after he had looked back at you while he was going
+upstairs?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin', boss. He seed I wuz lookin' at him, an' he jes' went on up an'
+out uv sight, in a hurry, like."</p>
+
+<p>"What time was that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dat wuz twenty-six minutes uv two."</p>
+
+<p>"How do you know that? You'd gone back to sleep, hadn't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh, a little niggerin'. But, when I woke up dat way widout no
+reason, I kinder jumped. I wuz afeer'd dat clock might be goin' to jar me
+ag'in, an' I took a look at it. Dat wuz how I seed de time. It wuz
+twenty-six minutes uv two."</p>
+
+<p>"What did you do then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin', boss; jes' went on niggerin' it. Dat is, I went on till de
+night clerk giv' me a kick on de shins and tole me to take Mistuh
+Morley's bags up to fo'-twenty-one. I done tole you dat was five minutes
+arftuh two. Den, when we got up to de room, I says to him: 'I thought you
+wuz in dis hotel half-hour ago, boss, when you had a beard.'</p>
+
+<p>"An' right off de bat I wuz sorry I said dat. He look' at me kinder mad
+an' he said: 'Whut you talkin' 'bout, boy? You mus' be talkin' in yore
+sleep!'</p>
+
+<p>"I come on back downstairs. He didn' have to say no mo'e. I tell you,
+boss, when a white man tell me I been talkin' in my sleep, I <i>is</i> been
+talkin' in my sleep&mdash;dar ain' no argufyin' 'bout it&mdash;I <i>is</i> been doin'
+dat ve'y thing."</p>
+
+<p>"But you thought Mr. Morley, the man with the grips, was the one you had
+seen going up the stairs and, also, the one you had seen going into the
+post-office&mdash;and, when you saw him on the stairs and on the street, he
+wore a beard? Is that it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I ain' thought nothin' 'bout it, boss. I knowed it."</p>
+
+<p>"What did you think about his shaving off the beard at that time in the
+morning?" Braceway urged, fingering the dollar bill. "Didn't you think
+it was queer?"</p>
+
+<p>"I tryin' to tell you, suh, I ain' done no thinkin' 'bout dat. He done
+said I wuz talkin' in my sleep, an' I is a prudent nigger."</p>
+
+<p>"Did he have a gold tooth, Roddy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh," said Roddy, "but he did look rich 'nough to have one.
+Leastways I ain' seen he had one."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you seen the man with the beard since?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh. I jes' tole you, boss, he done shave it off."</p>
+
+<p>"And Mr. Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh, I done seen him. He's in de hotel now. He's de same man."</p>
+
+<p>"Did he wear rubber overshoes when he had the beard, and when he didn't
+have it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yas, suh&mdash;bofe times."</p>
+
+<p>"Has he said anything to you since Monday night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you see anybody else that night&mdash;Monday night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you remember anything else about how the bearded man looked?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, suh, 'cep' he look' jes' like dis Mistuh Morley; dat's all I know,
+boss."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway got to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"All right, Roddy," he said heartily; "you're a good boy. Here's your
+dollar."</p>
+
+<p>Roddy rolled his white eyeballs toward the ceiling and bent his black
+face floorward.</p>
+
+<p>"Gawd bless you, boss! You is one good&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And here's another dollar, if you can keep your mouth shut about this
+until I tell you to open it. Can you do that?"</p>
+
+<p>Roddy conveyed the assurance of his ability to remain dumb until a
+considerable time after the sounding of Gabriel's trump.</p>
+
+<p>"See that you do. If you don't, I might have to arrest you after all."</p>
+
+<p>When the negro had gone, Braceway stood at the window and, with glance
+turned toward the street, saw nothing of what was passing there. He was
+reviewing the facts&mdash;or possible facts&mdash;that had just come to him.
+Restlessness took hold of him. He fell to pacing the length of the room
+with long, quick strides. It seemed that, in the labour of forcing his
+brain to its highest activity, he called on every fibre and muscle of his
+physique. His cheeks were flushed; his eyes, hard and brilliant, snapped.</p>
+
+<p>He was thinking&mdash;thinking, going over every particle of the evidence he
+had drawn from Roddy, trying to estimate its value when compared with
+everything else he had learned about the case. His stride grew more
+rapid; his breathing was faster.</p>
+
+<p>The murder, the men and women connected with it, the stories they had
+told, all these flashed on the screen of his mind and hung there until he
+had judged them to their smallest detail.</p>
+
+<p>What could Abrahamson have meant by indicating a belief that the man with
+the gold tooth looked like George Withers?</p>
+
+<p>Was the boy Roddy wide enough awake that night to have formed any real
+opinion as to the resemblance of the bearded man and Henry Morley?</p>
+
+<p>The trip to the post-office&mdash;did that explain the disappearance of the
+stolen jewelry? Had Morley mailed it at once to himself, or somebody
+else, in Washington?</p>
+
+<p>Withers had returned to the Brevord early Monday night. That must have
+been before half-past twelve. Although the night clerk and the bellboy
+had been asleep at the time and had not seen him, there was no room for
+doubt of his return as he had described it.</p>
+
+<p>And why should Morley, wearing the disguise, have waked up Roddy and
+assured himself, by the look flung over his shoulder, that the negro saw
+him on the stairs?</p>
+
+<p>Or had that been Morley, after all? What reason, what motive&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly, with the abruptness of a horse thrown back on his haunches, he
+stood stock still in the middle of the room, his brilliant eyes staring
+at the wall, his breathing faster than ever, as he considered the idea
+that had flashed upon him. The idea grew into a theory. It had never
+occurred to him before, and yet it was right. It must be. He had it! For
+the first time, he felt sure of himself, was convinced that he held a
+safe grasp on the case.</p>
+
+<p>He strode to the window and struck the sill with his fist. The tenseness
+went out of his body. He breathed a long sigh of relief. He had seen
+through the mist of puzzling facts and contradictory clues. The rest
+would be comparatively plain sailing.</p>
+
+<p>Some of Braceway's friends were in the habit of laughing at him because,
+when he was sure of having solved a criminal puzzle, he always could
+be seen carrying a cane. The appearance of the cane invariably foretold
+the arrest of a guilty man.</p>
+
+<p>He went now to the corner near the bureau and picked up the light
+walking-stick he had brought to Furmville strapped to his suitcase. He
+lingered, twirling the cane in his right hand. His thoughts went to the
+interview he and Bristow had had that morning with Fulton, whose white
+hair and deep-lined face were very clear before him. He recalled the old
+man's words:</p>
+
+<p>"She wept bitterly. I can hear her weeping now. She had a dash, a spirit,
+a joyous soul. This man none of you has been able to find has been in
+Enid's life for a good many years."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway's eyes softened.</p>
+
+<p>Well, there was no need to worry now. Things were coming his way. The old
+man would have his revenge. He put on his hat, deciding to go down for a
+late lunch. When he looked at his watch, he whistled. He had promised to
+be at the railroad station to see the funeral party off for Atlanta on
+the four o'clock train; and it was now half-past three. He hurried out.</p>
+
+<p>For the first time in his life, he had been guilty of taking a course
+which might lead to serious results, or to no results at all. He had
+permitted personal considerations to make "blind spots" in his brain.</p>
+
+<p>Because of a warm friendship for George Withers, he had rushed to
+conclusions which took no account of the dead woman's husband. He had
+forgotten that the faces of Morley and Withers were shaped on similar
+lines. If any other detective had done that, Braceway would have been the
+first to censure him.</p>
+
+<p>As he had expected, he found Withers and Mr. Fulton far ahead of train
+time. They had been passed through the gates and were standing on the
+platform. Braceway noticed that, of the two, the father was standing the
+ordeal with greater fortitude and calmness. Withers was nervous,
+fidgety, and seemed to find it impossible to stand in any one place. He
+drew Braceway to one side.</p>
+
+<p>"I've got something to tell you, Brace," he said in a low tone, his voice
+tremulous. "I didn't want to tell you for&mdash;for her sake. I thought it
+might cause useless talk, scandal. But you're working your head off for
+me, and you've a right to know about it."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't worry, George," Braceway reassured him. "Things are coming out all
+right. Don't talk if you don't feel like it."</p>
+
+<p>He said this because he was suddenly aware of the quality of suffering
+he saw in the man's eyes. It was so evident, so striking, that he felt
+surprised. Perhaps, he thought, he might have exaggerated things when he
+had told Bristow that Enid had subjected her husband to incessant
+disappointments and regrets. Withers now was mourning; in fact, he
+appeared overwhelmed, crushed.</p>
+
+<p>"It's this," Withers hurried on: "I was up there that night in front of
+the house until&mdash;until after one o'clock. You know I told you I was on
+the porch just across the road and went back to the hotel as soon as
+Campbell had turned his machine and gone home. That wasn't quite correct.
+I waited, because Enid didn't turn out the lights in the living room. It
+struck me as strange.</p>
+
+<p>"I waited, and I fell asleep. That seems funny&mdash;a husband infuriated with
+his wife and trying to find out what she is doing to deceive him goes
+to sleep while he's watching! But that's exactly what I did.</p>
+
+<p>"When I awoke, the lights were still on in the living room. I looked at
+my watch, and, although I couldn't see very well, I made out it was after
+one. I suppose I'd been asleep for half an hour at least. You see, I had
+had a hard night on the sleeper and a terrific day, and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. I understand that," Braceway consoled him. "Did you see anything,
+George?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I saw something all right," he struggled with the words. "As I
+looked up, a figure was silhouetted against the yellow window shade. It
+was a man's figure. It was after one in the morning, and a man was there
+with&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>His voice failed him altogether. Braceway, a perplexed look in his eyes,
+studied him uneasily.</p>
+
+<p>"The silhouette was quite plain. There was the clear-cut shadow of him
+from the waist up. It was so plain that I could see he was wearing
+a cap. I could see the visor of it, you know; a long visor. He was a
+well-built man, good shoulders, and so on.</p>
+
+<p>"As I got to my feet, the lights were turned off. I went across the
+street. I don't think I ran. It was raining. I was going to kill him.
+That was all I was thinking about. I was going to kill him, and I wanted
+to catch him unawares. I wasn't armed, and I was going to choke him to
+death."</p>
+
+<p>The train gates were opened, and passengers began to stream past them
+toward the train. Withers lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper. Braceway
+noticed the unpleasant sound of it.</p>
+
+<p>"He did what I expected; came down the steps without a sound. I didn't
+even hear him close the door. I can't say I saw him. It was pitch dark,
+and I sensed where he was. I was conscious of all his movements. When he
+reached the bottom step, I closed with him. I couldn't trust to hitting
+at him. It was too dark.</p>
+
+<p>"I put out my hands to get his throat, but I misjudged things. I caught
+him by the waist. He had on a raincoat. I could tell it by the feel of
+the cloth. And I couldn't get a good hold of him. While I struggled with
+him, he got me by the throat. He was a powerful man, a dozen times
+stronger than I am.</p>
+
+<p>"We swayed around there for a few minutes, a few seconds&mdash;I don't know
+which. We didn't make any noise. I couldn't do a thing. He choked me
+until I thought my head would burst open.</p>
+
+<p>"When he realized I was all in, he gave me a shove that made me reel down
+the walk a dozen steps. He didn't stop to see what I did. He ran. That
+is, I suppose he ran. I didn't hear him, and I didn't see him again. He
+disappeared&mdash;completely."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway looked at his watch. It was five minutes before train time.</p>
+
+<p>"What did you do then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you go, then? What did you think? Speed up, George! I want to
+get all this before you go."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Withers, a little catch in his throat; "I thought you ought
+to know about it. I&mdash;I stood there a moment, there in the rain, dazed,
+trying to get my breath. I'd intended going in to have it out with Enid.
+But I didn't. I suppose I knew, if I did, I'd kill her. And I guess now
+I would have.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, I hadn't the faintest notion that anything had happened to her;
+had hurt her, I mean. I got myself in hand. I didn't do anything. I went
+back to the hotel. I planned to have a last talk with her later in the
+day."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me," Braceway asked with undisguised eagerness, "did this man wear
+a beard?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think so. I've been thinking about that all day. I think he did, but
+I'm not sure."</p>
+
+<p>"But you saw the plain silhouette, the outline of his head and body!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. He might have had a beard, and again he might not. He was heavily
+built, with a short, thick neck, and, in the attitude he was in,
+foreshortened by the light being above him, a strong chin might have
+been magnified, might have cast a shadow like that of a beard."</p>
+
+<p>"And when you were struggling with him? How about that? Didn't you get
+close to his face?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; but he was taller than I was&mdash;I don't know&mdash;I can't remember. But I
+think he had the beard, all right."</p>
+
+<p>"He didn't make any noise on the steps, you say. Did he have rubber
+shoes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. My guess would be that he did."</p>
+
+<p>The conductor began to shout, "All aboard!"</p>
+
+<p>They started toward the Atlanta pullman.</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't have told you&mdash;I can't see that any of this could affect the
+final result&mdash;but for the fact that something might have come up to
+embarrass you," Withers explained, still with the unpleasant, rattling
+whisper. "It might have led you to think I hadn't been frank with you."</p>
+
+<p>He had his foot on the first step of the car. The porter was evidently
+anxious to get aboard and close the vestibule door.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?" Braceway caught him by the sleeve.</p>
+
+<p>"Somehow," Withers leaned down to whisper, "in the struggle, I think, I
+dropped&mdash;I lost my watch. Somebody must have picked it up, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"Damn!" exploded Braceway angrily. "Why didn't&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>The train began to move. The porter put his hand to Withers' elbow and
+hurried him up the steps.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI</h2>
+
+<h3>A MESSAGE FROM MISS FULTON</h3>
+
+
+<p>It was a little after three o'clock when Chief Greenleaf and Lawrence
+Bristow finished their "celebration dinner" and took their seats on the
+porch of No. 9. The host, accomplishing the impossible in a prohibition
+state, had produced a bottle of champagne, explaining: "Just for you,
+chief; I never touch it;" and the chief had enjoyed it, unmistakably.</p>
+
+<p>At Bristow's suggestion they refrained from discussing any phase of the
+murder during the meal.</p>
+
+<p>"All we have to do now," he said, "is to see that the knot in Perry's
+rope is artistically tied&mdash;and that's not appetizing."</p>
+
+<p>"I've got something new," Greenleaf contributed; "but you're right. We'll
+wait until after dinner."</p>
+
+<p>They were greatly pleased with what they had accomplished; and each one,
+without giving it voice, knew the other's pleasure was increased by the
+thought that they had got the better of Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>They saw from the porch that an automobile was standing in front of
+No. 5. As they settled back in their chairs, Fulton and George Withers
+left the bungalow and got into the machine.</p>
+
+<p>"They're going to take the body to Atlanta on the four o'clock," said
+Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>For a moment they watched the receding automobile. Then Bristow inquired,
+"What's the new thing you've dug up?"</p>
+
+<p>"The report from the Charlotte laboratories."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you got that&mdash;by wire?"</p>
+
+<p>The lame man seemed indifferent about it.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; by wire," Greenleaf paused, as if he enjoyed whetting the other's
+curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow made no comment. He gave the impression of being confident that
+the report could contain nothing of value.</p>
+
+<p>"You ain't very anxious to know what it is," the chief complained. "I
+nearly had a fit until it came."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it doesn't matter much, one way or the other," Bristow said,
+conscious of Greenleaf's petulance. "The thing's settled anyway."</p>
+
+<p>"That may be true; but it don't do any harm to get everything we can. The
+laboratory reported what you thought they'd report. Nothing under Miss
+Fulton's nails; particles of a white person's skin, epidermis, under
+Perry's."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow laughed pleasantly, his eyes suddenly more alight.</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon, chief; I was having a little fun with you&mdash;by
+pretending indifference. But it's great&mdash;better than I'd really dared
+expect. It's the only direct, first-hand evidence we can offer showing
+that the negro, beyond any dispute, did attack her."</p>
+
+<p>He laughed again. "Let's see the wire."</p>
+
+<p>"I guess it settles the whole business," Greenleaf exulted, passing him
+the telegram.</p>
+
+<p>He read it and handed it back.</p>
+
+<p>"After that," he commented, "I'm almost tempted to throw away what I had
+to show you; its importance dwindles."</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"A confession by Lucy Thomas that Perry went to Number Five the night,
+rather the morning, of the murder."</p>
+
+<p>"You got that&mdash;from her!" exclaimed Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;signed."</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Bristow, you're a wonder! By cripes, you are! My men couldn't get
+anything out of her. Neither could I."</p>
+
+<p>"Here it is. I wrote out her story and read it back to her, and she
+signed it."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf took the paper and read it:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I know Perry Carpenter went to Mrs. Withers' house Monday night. He and
+I had been drinking together, and I was nearly drunk, but he was only
+about half-drunk. He told me he knew where he could get a lot of money,
+or 'something just as good as money,' because he had seen 'that white
+woman' with it. He and I had a fight because he wanted me to give him the
+key to Mrs. Withers' house, to her kitchen door.</p>
+
+<p>"He broke the ribbon on which I used to hang the key around my neck, and
+he went out. That was pretty late in the night. Before daylight, he came
+back and flung the key on the floor, and he cursed me and hit me. I had
+two keys on the ribbon, one to Number Five, Manniston Road, and one to
+the house where I worked before I went to Mrs. Withers. He had taken the
+wrong one. When he hit me, he said: 'You think you're damn smart, giving
+me the wrong key; but that didn't stop me.' He seemed to be drunker then
+than he was when he went out earlier in the night.</p>
+
+<p>(Signed) "Lucy Thomas."</p></div>
+
+<p>The chief whistled. "How in thunder did you get this out of the woman?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sent for her and had a talk with her. She told so many stories and
+contradicted herself so much that, at last, she broke down and let me
+have the real facts."</p>
+
+<p>"Will she stick to what she says in this paper?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes. There won't be any trouble about that."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf offered him the signed confession.</p>
+
+<p>"No; keep it," he said. "It's your property, not mine."</p>
+
+<p>The chief folded it and put it carefully into his breast pocket.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder," he speculated, "what Mr. Braceway will say to this."</p>
+
+<p>"He'll realize that the case is settled. But I don't think he'll quit
+work."</p>
+
+<p>"Why won't he, if he sees we've got the guilty man?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's what I'd like to know. I believe&mdash;this is between you and me&mdash;I
+believe he's working more for George Withers now than he is for the
+state. You see, as I've already told you, there may be some family
+scandal in this, something the husband wants to keep quiet. Braceway will
+be satisfied as soon as we show him that the only thing we want is to
+present the evidence against the negro; that we take no interest in
+private scandals. But there's one thing, however, chief, I wish you'd do:
+let Morley go to Washington on the midnight train tonight instead of
+making him wait until tomorrow."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"If Braceway won't let matters drop as they are now, he'll insist on
+following Morley to Washington. If he does, I'm going, too; and we might
+as well get it over."</p>
+
+<p>"You're not afraid our case won't hold water, are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. The case stands on its own feet. There's no power on earth that
+could break it down."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, why&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you why, chief. I've been set down here with this
+tuberculosis. You know what that means, at least, several years of
+convalescence. Why shouldn't I make use of those years, develop a
+business in which I can engage while I'm here? This murder case has
+opened the door for me, and I'm going to take advantage of it. Lawrence
+Bristow, consulting detective and criminologist. How does that strike
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fine!" said Greenleaf heartily. "And you're right. Your reputation's
+made; and, even if you had to be away from Furmville a few days at a time
+now and then, it wouldn't hurt your health."</p>
+
+<p>The chief's tendency to claim credit for Carpenter's arrest had
+disappeared. He liked Bristow, was impressed by his quiet effectiveness.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad you think I can get away with it," the lame man said, much
+pleased. "Now, you see why I want to go to Washington with Braceway. It's
+merely to keep my hold on this case. If you say I'm entitled to the
+credit for reading the riddle, I'm going to see that I get the credit."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. I'll let Morley know he can go tonight, and he needn't worry
+about our troubling him."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks. The sooner we gather up every little strand of evidence, the
+better it will be."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf prepared to leave. As he stood up, he caught sight of a young
+man coming up Manniston Road.</p>
+
+<p>"A stranger," he announced. "Another detective?"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow glanced down the street.</p>
+
+<p>"No. It's a newspaper correspondent. That's my guess. The Washington and
+New York papers have had time to send special men here by now for feature
+stories."</p>
+
+<p>The young man went briskly up the steps of No. 5.</p>
+
+<p>"I was right," concluded Bristow. "If you run into him, chief, do the
+talking for the two of us. Just tell him I refuse to be interviewed."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?" demanded Greenleaf. "An interview would give you good
+advertising."</p>
+
+<p>"There's just one sort of publicity that's better than talking," said
+Bristow laconically; "aloofness, mystery. It makes people wonder, keeps
+them talking."</p>
+
+<p>It happened as Bristow had thought. Greenleaf, going down the walk, met
+the stranger, special correspondent of a New York paper. They had a short
+colloquy, the newspaper man looking frequently toward No. 9, and finally
+they turned and went down Manniston Road.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, leaving his chair to go back to the sleeping porch, saw Miss
+Kelly come out of No. 5 and hurry in his direction. He waited for her.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton wants to see you, Mr. Bristow," said the nurse. "She asked
+me to tell you it's very important."</p>
+
+<p>He was frankly surprised.</p>
+
+<p>"Wants to see me, Miss Kelly?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; at once, if you can come."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, certainly."</p>
+
+<p>He stepped into the house and got his hat.</p>
+
+<p>"How is Miss Fulton?" he inquired, descending the steps with Miss Kelly.</p>
+
+<p>"Much better. In fact, she seemed in good spirits and fairly strong as
+soon as her father and Mr. Withers left. That was about half an hour
+ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps, their departure helped her," he suggested, smiling. "Often
+one's family is annoying&mdash;we may love them, but we want them at a lovable
+distance."</p>
+
+<p>She gave him an approving smile.</p>
+
+<p>"What about the medicine?" he asked as they reached the door. "Has she
+had much bromide&mdash;stuff like that?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; not today. Her mind's perfectly clear."</p>
+
+<p>He put one more question:</p>
+
+<p>"Do you happen to know why she wishes to see me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think it's something about her brother-in-law, Mr. Withers."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! I wonder whether&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He did not finish the sentence, but, stepping into the living room,
+waited for Miss Kelly to announce his arrival.</p>
+
+<p>The quick mechanism of his mind informed him that he was about to be
+confronted with some totally unexpected situation.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h2>
+
+<h3>MISS FULTON'S REVELATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Prepared as he was for surprise, his emotion, when he was ushered into
+Miss Fulton's room, was little short of amazement. The girl was
+transformed. Instead of a spoiled child, with petulant expression, he
+beheld a calm, well controlled woman who greeted him cordially with a
+smile. Overnight, it seemed, she had developed into maturity.</p>
+
+<p>Wearing a simple, pale blue neglig&eacute;e, and propped up in bed, as she had
+been the day before, she had now in her attitude nothing of the weakness
+she had shown during his former interview with her. For the first time,
+he saw that she was a handsome woman, and it was no longer hard for him
+to realize why Braceway had been in love with her. He waited for her to
+explain why he had been summoned.</p>
+
+<p>"I've taken affairs into my own hands&mdash;that is, my affairs," she said.
+"There's something you should know."</p>
+
+<p>"If there is anything&mdash;&mdash;" he began the polite formula.</p>
+
+<p>"First," she told him, "I'd better explain that father ordered me to
+discuss the&mdash;my sister's death with nobody except Judge Rogers. You know
+who he is, the attorney here. Father and George have retained him. I
+haven't seen him yet. I wanted to give you certain facts. I know you'll
+make the just, proper use of them."</p>
+
+<p>"Then I was right? You do know&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she said, exhibiting, so far as he could observe, no excitement
+whatever; "I was not asleep the whole of Monday night. I narrowly escaped
+seeing my sister die&mdash;seeing her murdered."</p>
+
+<p>Her lips trembled momentarily, but she took hold of herself remarkably. A
+trifle incredulous, he watched her closely.</p>
+
+<p>"I heard a noise in the living room. It wasn't a loud noise. The fact
+that it was guarded, or cautious, waked me up, I think. Before I got out
+of bed, I looked at my watch. It was somewhere in the neighbourhood of
+one o'clock&mdash;I'm not sure how many minutes after one. As I reached the
+little hallway opening into the dining room, I heard a man's voice.</p>
+
+<p>"He was not talking aloud. It was a hurried sort of whisper. It seemed as
+if the voice, when at its natural pitch, would have been high or thin,
+more of a tenor than anything else. It gave me the impression of
+terrific anger, anger and threat combined. The only thing I heard from
+my sister was a stifled sound, as if she had tried to cry out and been
+prevented by&mdash;by choking."</p>
+
+<p>She looked out the window, her breast rising and falling while she
+compelled herself to calmness.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was looking at her with hawk-like keenness.</p>
+
+<p>"And what did you do?" he asked, his voice low and cool.</p>
+
+<p>"I pulled the dining room door open. From where I stood, looking across
+the dining room into the living room, I could see the edge of my sister's
+skirt and&mdash;and a man's leg, the right leg.</p>
+
+<p>"That is, I didn't see much of his leg. What I did see was his foot, the
+sole of his shoe, a large shoe. He was in such a position that the foot
+was resting on its toes, perpendicular to the floor, so that I saw the
+whole sole of the rubber shoe."</p>
+
+<p>She put both hands to her face and closed her eyes, holding the attitude
+for several minutes. When she looked at him again, there were no tears
+in her eyes, but the traces of fear.</p>
+
+<p>"It seemed to me that he was leaning far forward, putting most of his
+weight on his left foot and balancing himself with the right thrust out
+behind him. There was something in the position of that leg which
+suggested great strength.</p>
+
+<p>"All that came to me in a minute, in a second. When I realized what I
+saw, the danger to Enid, I fainted, just crumpled up and slid to the
+floor, and everything went black before me. I don't think I had made a
+sound since leaving the sleeping porch."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow spoke quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton, who was the man?"</p>
+
+<p>She overcame a momentary reluctance.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not sure," she said slowly. "I am not sure. I thought it was either
+Henry Morley or George Withers."</p>
+
+<p>She turned away. A tremor shook her from head to foot.</p>
+
+<p>"Why?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"First, the voice," she replied, her face still averted. "It could so
+easily have been Mr. Morley's high voice lowered to a whisper; or it
+might have been George Withers'. When he's angry, his deep voice
+undergoes a curious change; it's horrid."</p>
+
+<p>"And the second reason?"</p>
+
+<p>"The man wore rubbers." She turned her face toward him. "I had seen Mr.
+Morley put his on two hours before that."</p>
+
+<p>"How about your brother-in-law?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's a crank on the subject&mdash;never goes out in the rain unless he has
+them on."</p>
+
+<p>"Think a moment, Miss Fulton. Couldn't that man have been a negro&mdash;the
+negro who is now held for the crime? He wore rubber-soled shoes. Could
+you swear that what you saw was not a rubber sole attached to a leather
+or canvass shoe?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; I couldn't."</p>
+
+<p>"And the voice? Did you hear any of the man's words? Could you swear that
+it wasn't the illiterate talk of an uneducated negro?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; I couldn't."</p>
+
+<p>"What made you think of Morley and Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Morley was in a raging temper with my sister when he left me&mdash;in
+connection with money matters. You know about that part of the affair?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And George's voice is always like the one I heard. It's like that when
+he gets&mdash;used to get&mdash;into a temper with Enid."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow felt immensely relieved. He was so sure of his case against Perry
+Carpenter that he refused to consider anything tending to obscure his own
+theory.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you still sure it was Mr. Morley or Mr. Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think now," she answered, her voice hardly above a whisper, "it was
+George Withers."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Let me explain again. I lay there, where I had fainted, for hours, until
+just a few minutes before you answered my call for help. I must have had
+a terrific shock. When I recovered consciousness, I stumbled into the
+living room and saw&mdash;saw Enid. Her&mdash;oh, Mr. Bristow!&mdash;the sight of her
+face, of her mouth, paralyzed my voice.</p>
+
+<p>"I stood on the porch and tried to scream, but at first I couldn't. I
+only gasped and choked. I started down the steps, reached the bottom, and
+then found I could make myself heard. I ran back up the steps and stood
+there shrieking until I saw you coming. I suppose nobody had seen me go
+down the steps."</p>
+
+<p>"But that hasn't anything to do with Mr. Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;yes, it has. When I went down the porch steps, I saw something
+lying in the grass, on the upper side of the steps, the side toward your
+house."</p>
+
+<p>She slipped her hand under one of the pillows.</p>
+
+<p>"It was this."</p>
+
+<p>She handed to Bristow an open-faced gold watch. He read on the back of it
+the initials, "G. S. W."</p>
+
+<p>"It's George Withers' watch," she said, "and, when I found it, he had not
+been on this side of Manniston Road, according to the story he told you
+and the chief of police."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was thinking intently, a frown creasing his forehead. He was
+wishing that she had not found the watch. He reminded himself of the
+hysterical condition she had been in the day before. Perhaps, after all,
+this story was nothing but an unconscious invention&mdash;a fantasy which she
+thought to be the truth.</p>
+
+<p>"Why did you refuse yesterday to tell me this; and why do you volunteer
+it now?" he inquired, holding her glance with a cold, level look.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid you won't understand," she answered, a little smile lifting
+the corners of her mouth, a smile which, somehow, still had in it a great
+deal of sorrow. "Yesterday I was still under the influence of the way I
+had lived all my life, subjugated, as it were, by the fact that my older
+sister was my father's favourite and by the further fact that my sister's
+personality was stronger than mine&mdash;at least, I had been taught to think
+so.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't want you to think I didn't love my sister. I did; but it made a
+cry-baby out of me. I always relied on others&mdash;do you see? But now, that
+influence is gone. I'm my own mistress; and I know it. I can and must do
+what strikes me as right."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, close student of human nature that he was, did understand. There
+flashed across his mind a passage he had read in something by George
+Bernard Shaw: that nobody ever loses a friend or relative by death
+without experiencing some measure of relief.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I see what you mean," he assented; "its an instance of submerged
+personality&mdash;something of that sort."</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Braceway is working with you, isn't he?" she asked suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes," he replied, surprised.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought," she continued, "that what I had seen would be of service
+to you and him. And I can't understand why father and George want
+all this secrecy. One would think they were afraid of finding out
+something&mdash;something to make them ashamed! What I want is to see the
+guilty man punished&mdash;that's all."</p>
+
+<p>He recalled Braceway's statement that he had been engaged to marry Maria
+Fulton. Could it be that she still loved him, and that the engagement to
+Morley, her helping him financially, had been all a pretense, the pitiful
+product of pique toward Braceway to show him she cared nothing for him?
+And now she wanted to help Braceway, not Bristow?</p>
+
+<p>He decided to ignore that part of the situation. The obvious
+incrimination of Withers gave him enough to think about. He was sorry it
+had happened. He did not believe there was the shadow of a case against
+him.</p>
+
+<p>He rose and handed the watch to Miss Fulton.</p>
+
+<p>"No," she objected; "I don't want it. You and Mr. Braceway, perhaps, will
+make use of it."</p>
+
+<p>He hesitated before putting it into his pocket.</p>
+
+<p>"Why did you send for me, Miss Fulton?" he asked, after thanking her for
+doing so. "Why me instead of your lawyer, Judge Rogers?"</p>
+
+<p>"He would have forbidden me to talk," she answered simply; "and I wanted
+to talk. I refuse ever again to carry around with me other people's
+secrets. It's too oppressive."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you told this to anybody else?&mdash;or do you intend to?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; nobody; and I won't."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, one thing about Mr. Morley: do you think he has stolen money&mdash;from
+his bank, for instance?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, no! He was speculating&mdash;and losing. I'm glad you asked about him.
+I shall never see him again&mdash;never!"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow left her with the assurance that he and Braceway would make the
+best possible use of her theory and the facts she had adduced. He walked
+slowly back to his bungalow, his limp more pronounced than usual. He felt
+physically very tired.</p>
+
+<p>But of one thing he was still certain: the strength of his case
+against Perry Carpenter. He chose to stick to that, much more stubbornly
+than Braceway had refused to consider minutely the exact situation of
+Withers in regard to the crime. If Withers had murdered his wife,
+circumstances were now ideally in his favour. The two men, unusually
+brainy, quick thinkers, who were recognized by the police and the public
+as able to bring punishment on the guilty man, had other and opposing
+theories&mdash;theories which they were resolved to "put over," to
+substantiate. As matters stood now, the story Bristow had just heard was
+hardly a factor. The detectives were busy with ideas of their own.</p>
+
+<p>Maria Fulton, after the lame man had left her, lay back against her
+pillows and looked out the window with misty eyes. Counteracting the
+sorrow that had weighed upon her for two days, was her speculation as to
+how Braceway would receive the facts she had revealed.</p>
+
+<p>Would he see that her course was one which she intended to be of help to
+him?&mdash;that, not knowing how he would treat a direct message from her, she
+had sent it to him through another?&mdash;that she desired, above all things,
+his success in the investigation?</p>
+
+<p>"When I spoke to this man of Sam Braceway, my whole manner was a
+revelation of how I felt&mdash;a frank declaration! And, of course, he will
+tell him. If he doesn't&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She called Miss Kelly.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII</h2>
+
+<h3>WHAT'S BRACEWAY'S GAME?</h3>
+
+
+<p>Braceway, keeping his promise to have another conference with Bristow,
+sat on the porch of No. 9 and watched the last golden streamers the
+setting sun had flung above the blue edges of the mountains.</p>
+
+<p>He still carried his cane.</p>
+
+<p>"What's your plan now, Mr. Braceway?" Bristow inquired. "You think you'll
+follow Morley to Washington?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not follow him," the detective answered smilingly. "I'm going with him.
+That is, I'll take the same train he does."</p>
+
+<p>"Greenleaf told you, I suppose, that he'd given Morley permission to
+leave tonight?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;said you suggested it. And I think you're right. There's no use in
+losing time unnecessarily. Are you going, too?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, by all means," Bristow said quickly, "and against my doctor's
+orders. That is, if you don't object&mdash;if you don't think I'd be in the
+way."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway was clearly aware of the lame man's desire to accompany him so
+as to be associated with every phase of the work on the case, and to make
+it stand out emphatically in the long run that he, Bristow, pitting his
+ingenuity against Braceway, had gathered the evidence establishing the
+negro's guilt beyond question. The idea amused him, he was so sure of the
+accuracy of his own theory.</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all," he said heartily. "I want you to come."</p>
+
+<p>"How about avoiding him on the train? We don't want him to know we're his
+fellow-travellers."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no. He'll get aboard at the station here. I have a machine to take
+me&mdash;and you, of course&mdash;to Larrimore, the station seven miles out.
+They'll flag the train. We'll get into a stateroom and stay there; have
+our meals served right there. You see, we don't get into Washington until
+dark tomorrow night."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I see. The scheme's all right."</p>
+
+<p>They were silent for several minutes.</p>
+
+<p>"I've been thinking," said Bristow, "about Mrs. Withers having kept all
+her jewelry in the bungalow&mdash;unprotected, you know&mdash;nobody but her
+sister and herself there. It was risky."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," agreed Braceway. "What do you get from that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps she was waiting&mdash;knew demands for money might come at any
+time&mdash;and was afraid to be caught without them."</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly. That's the way I figured it."</p>
+
+<p>They were silent again.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway was the first to speak. He narrated all the facts he had learned
+from Abrahamson and Roddy, and concluded with the story Withers had told
+him on the station platform. He held back none of the details. Evidently,
+his irritation toward Withers had subsided. When Bristow handed him the
+watch Maria Fulton had found, he said laughingly:</p>
+
+<p>"It's a good thing George told me about it, isn't it? Otherwise, we might
+have had to devote a lot of time to showing that he had nothing to do
+with the crime itself."</p>
+
+<p>"And yet," qualified Bristow, "he said nothing to explain why the watch
+should have been so far back in the grass and to the side of the steps in
+this direction. According to his story, he must have dropped it on the
+other side, the down side."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see how it could have fallen where Miss Fulton found it unless
+somebody had actually picked it up and thrown it there. He told you he
+was all the time down on the sidewalk, and, when the other man flung him
+off, he reeled down-hill, not up."</p>
+
+<p>"That's hair-splitting," Braceway objected good-humouredly. "Nothing
+could make me think George responsible for the murder."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow repeated then everything Maria Fulton had said that afternoon,
+and gave a fair, clear idea of her strong suspicion that the murder had
+actually been done by either Withers or Morley. It had no effect on
+Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Fulton," he said, "told you, of course, what she had seen and heard
+and, in addition, what she had guessed. But I don't see that it changes
+anything. I can't let it make me suspect Withers any more than I can
+accept as valuable Abrahamson's quite positive opinion that the man
+wearing the disguise was Withers. Things don't fit in. That's all. They
+don't fit into such a theory."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you ever thought," persisted Bristow, "why Withers told Greenleaf
+and me yesterday morning that he was in the pawnshop when the man with
+the gold tooth was in there? Why should he say that when Abrahamson
+contradicts it at once by telling you they were at no time in the shop
+simultaneously?"</p>
+
+<p>"Did Withers say to you outright, flat and unmistakably, that he saw the
+fellow inside the shop?" Braceway's voice had in it the ring of
+combativeness.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow tried to remember the exact words Withers had used. Also, his
+harping on Withers' possible guilt struck him as absurd when he
+considered the strength of the case against Perry.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't swear he did," he admitted at last; "but there's no doubt about
+the impression he gave us. Why, Abrahamson himself told you Greenleaf was
+positive Withers and the other man were there at the same time."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," Braceway said, obviously a little bored, "That's one of the things
+we have to watch for in these cases&mdash;wild impressions, the construing of
+words in a different way by everybody who heard them. It's a minor detail
+anyway."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't get you at all," Bristow said, eyeing him intently.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"Your conviction that Morley's the guilty man, your refusal to accept the
+case against Perry Carpenter, and your impatience in discussing Withers."</p>
+
+<p>"Think over Miss Fulton's story," Braceway retorted. "If it does anything
+at all, it strengthens the suspicion that Morley's the man we want. And
+Roddy's story&mdash;on its face, it damns Morley! Withers had no motive
+except, a remote possibility, that of jealousy. Morley's motive was as
+old as time; the desperate need of money."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, let's grant that, for the moment. What do you do with the evidence
+against the negro? He was after money."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"To tell the truth," he admitted, "I don't do anything with it. I'll go
+further: it seems flawless, and yet&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>His face settled into serious lines.</p>
+
+<p>"The report from the laboratory is unanswerable," Bristow went on. "It's
+as good as a statement from an eyewitness."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; it is. Still, in some way, I don't feel sure&mdash;But I'll say this: if
+my trip to Washington, our trip, isn't successful, I'll quit guessing and
+theorizing. I'll agree, without reservation, that Perry's the man."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow hesitated before making his next remark:</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, I'm not employed by Withers. My only connection with the case
+is a volunteer one. Yours is entirely different&mdash;and I realize that there
+may be&mdash;well&mdash;things you know and don't want me to know. But I can't help
+wondering whether Morley is the only consideration that takes you to
+Washington, whether there mightn't be something else relating, in a way,
+to the case&mdash;relating to it and yet not necessarily tied to it directly."</p>
+
+<p>"What kind of something?" Braceway retorted.</p>
+
+<p>"Say, for instance, something ugly, something painful to Fulton and
+Withers&mdash;terrific scandal, perhaps."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway thought a moment.</p>
+
+<p>"You've a keen mind, Mr. Bristow," he said finally. "I can't discuss that
+phase of it now, but you're partially right; although I'll say frankly,
+if Morley wasn't going to Washington, I wouldn't go either."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks; I appreciate your telling me that much. Now, let me ask one more
+question: why, exactly are you following Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you," Braceway replied with spirit. "It's a fair question, and
+I'll answer it. I'm going there on a hunch. I can't persuade myself that
+Perry's guilty, and I've a hunch that I'm now on the trail of the right
+man. And, as long as I'm in the business as a professional detective, I
+don't propose to disregard one scintilla of evidence, one smallest clue.
+I'll run down every tip and any hunch before I'll quit a case, saying
+virtually: 'Well, that man, or this man, <i>seems</i> guilty; go ahead and
+string him up.'</p>
+
+<p>"No innocent man's going to his death as long as I feel there's a chance
+of the guilty fellow being around and laughing up his sleeve. That's the
+whole thing in a nutshell. That's why I'm after Morley! That's why I'm
+going to Washington."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, responding warmly to the other's voice and mood, leaned forward
+and grasped his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Good!" he said. "That's fine&mdash;and I'm with you."</p>
+
+<p>"It's the only way to look at this work. Without the proper ideals, it's
+a rotten business. But, with the right viewpoint, it's great, at times
+far more valuable than the work of lawyers and judges."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad you said that," Bristow declared; "very glad, because I'm
+thinking of going into it myself."</p>
+
+<p>"You are?" Braceway appeared surprised; or his emotion might have been
+sympathy for a man driven to the choice of a new profession in life.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I was talking about it to Greenleaf this afternoon. I realize&mdash;I'd
+be foolish if I didn't&mdash;that this case has given me a lot of publicity.
+It has put me where I can say I know something about crime and criminals,
+although, up until this murder, the knowledge has been mostly on paper."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I know."</p>
+
+<p>"But now, since I'm stuck down here for this long convalescence, it's the
+best thing I can do; in fact, it's the only thing. I've drifted through
+life fooling with real estate and writing now and then a little, a very
+little, poor fiction. Neither occupation would support me in Furmville;
+and I think I could make good as a sort of consulting detective and
+criminologist. There's money in it, isn't there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; good money," Braceway replied without much enthusiasm. "But there
+are times when it's heart-breaking work, this thing of running down the
+guilty, the scum of the earth, the failures, the rotters, and the rats.
+It isn't all a Fourth of July celebration with the bands playing and your
+name in the papers."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I understand that. Any profession has its drawbacks."</p>
+
+<p>"But you have the analytical mind. And, as I just said, there's money in
+it."</p>
+
+<p>The glow had faded from the sky, and, with the darkness, there had come a
+noticeable chill in the air. Braceway yawned and stretched his arms. In
+addition to his talks with Abrahamson, Roddy, and Withers, he had also
+interviewed Perry and Lucy Thomas.</p>
+
+<p>"By George!" he said explosively. "I'm tired. I don't know when I've been
+this tired. This has been a real day, something popping every minute
+since I got here this morning."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow did not answer that. He was thinking of the impression he had
+received from Maria Fulton that she was still in love with Braceway. He
+had had that idea quite vividly while talking to her. He wondered now
+whether he had better mention it to Braceway. No, he decided; the time
+for that would come after the grinding work in Washington. Bristow
+himself was far from being a sentimental man. If he had been in
+Braceway's place, he would have preferred to hear nothing about the girl
+and her emotions until after the completion of the work.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you packed up?" Braceway asked. "Ready to go?"</p>
+
+<p>"Almost."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, suppose we drift on down to the Brevord. No; I forgot. You'd
+rather drive down, wouldn't you? Walking would bother that leg. I'll send
+the machine up for you."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks," Bristow accepted appreciatively. "That will be best."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. I'll have it up here in an hour or so. You can pick me up,
+and we'll run out to Larrimore."</p>
+
+<p>He went down Manniston Road, his heels striking hard against the
+concrete. Under the light at the far corner he flashed into Bristow's
+vision, twirling his cane on his thumb; his erect, alert figure giving
+little evidence of the weariness he had felt a few minutes before.</p>
+
+<p>The lame man lingered on the porch, considering Braceway's confident
+assertion that he did not "propose to disregard one scintilla of
+evidence, one smallest clue." But, he reflected, that was exactly what
+Braceway was doing: not only disregarding one scintilla, but keeping
+himself blind to a great many clues, the evidence against George Withers
+and that against the negro.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't make out his game," he concluded. "What's his idea about
+scandal, I wonder? The only possible scandal lies in the fact that Mrs.
+Withers paid blackmail for years. And the only way to make the fact
+public is to keep on denying that Perry's guilty. He seems to be trying
+to dig up scandal instead of hiding it."</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly, with his characteristic quickness of thought, he realized that
+he disliked Braceway, definitely felt an aversion for him. When he was
+in Braceway's presence, influenced by his vitality and magnetism and
+listening to his conversation, he lost sight of his real feeling; but,
+left to himself, it came to the surface strongly. He wished he had never
+met the man. He knew he would never get close to him. And yet, he
+thought, why dislike him?</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, he isn't my kind. <i>I</i> don't know. Yes, I know. He's just an edition
+de luxe of the ordinary four-flusher, a lot of biff-bang talk and bluff."
+He laughed, perhaps ridiculing himself. "Why waste mental energy on him?
+I've worked this case out. He hasn't."</p>
+
+<p>And public opinion was with him. It conceded that he had the right answer
+to the puzzle. At that very moment the "star" reporter of <i>The Sentinel</i>
+was hammering out on his typewriter the following paragraph for
+publication in the morning:</p>
+
+<p>"While it is generally recognized that Chief Greenleaf deserves great
+praise for the promptness with which the guilty man was discovered, the
+chief himself called attention this evening to the invaluable assistance
+he had received from Mr. Lawrence Bristow, already a well-known authority
+on crime. It was Bristow who, in addition to other brilliant work, forged
+the last and most impressive link in the chain of evidence against
+Carpenter. He did this by suggesting that the tests be made to determine
+whether or not the negro's finger nails showed traces of a white person's
+skin."</p>
+
+<p>Later on in his story, the reporter wrote:</p>
+
+<p>"Not a clue has yet been uncovered leading to the location of the stolen
+jewelry."</p>
+
+<p>If Braceway could have read that, he would have said: "Wait until we get
+to Washington. That's where we'll come across the jewels. Give us time."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, having a different opinion, would have refused to divulge it.
+The last thing he expected, was any such result in Washington.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX</h2>
+
+<h3>AT THE ANDERSON NATIONAL BANK</h3>
+
+
+<p>When the train pulled into Washington at eleven o'clock, Henry Morley,
+the first passenger to alight, shook off the red-cap porters who grabbed
+at his grips, and hurried toward the gates. Braceway, well hidden by
+shadows just inside the big side-door of one of the baggage coaches,
+observed how pale and haggard he looked under the strong glare of the
+arc-lights.</p>
+
+<p>"Hardly more than a kid!" thought the detective, with involuntary
+sympathy. "Why is it that most of the criminals are merely children? If
+they were all hardened and abandoned old thugs this work would be
+easier."</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, he kept his eyes on Morley and, a moment later, moved a
+step forward. This made him visible to a well-dressed, sleek-looking man
+who up to that time had been standing on the dark side of the great steel
+pillar directly across the platform from the baggage car. Braceway, with
+a quick gesture, indicated the identity of Morley, and the sleek-looking
+man, suddenly coming to life, fell into the stream of street-bound
+passengers.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway went back to the Pullman and rejoined Bristow, who was waiting
+for him in the stateroom.</p>
+
+<p>In the taxicab on their way to the Willard Hotel, the lame man lay back
+against the cushion, apparently tired out and making no pretense of
+interest in anything. Braceway muttered something inaudible.</p>
+
+<p>"What's that?" Bristow asked, opening his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I'd been thinking what a pity it is that most criminals are youngsters.
+When you nab them, you feel as if they hadn't a fair show; it hardly
+seems a sporting proposition. After that, I soothed myself by considering
+the satisfaction one feels in landing the old birds, the ones who know
+better."</p>
+
+<p>"I can appreciate that," the other agreed. "That may be one reason why
+I'm glad I've fastened the thing on an ignorant negro rather than on a
+fellow like Morley."</p>
+
+<p>"You've too much confidence in circumstantial evidence, Bristow. I
+remember what an old lawyer once told me: 'Circumstantial evidence is
+like a woman, too tricky&mdash;and tells a different story every day.'"</p>
+
+<p>At the Willard, finding that adjoining rooms were not to be had, they
+were put on different floors. Going toward the elevators, Braceway said:</p>
+
+<p>"Unless something unexpected turns up, let's have breakfast at eight."</p>
+
+<p>"And then, what?"</p>
+
+<p>"Go to the Anderson National Bank. A man named Beale, Joseph Beale, is
+its president. We'll have to persuade him to have the records examined,
+to see how Morley stands. If he's wrong, short, the rest will be easy."</p>
+
+<p>"Very good. Did your man pick him up at the train?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes. Platt's always on the job. He and his partner, Delaney,
+generally deliver."</p>
+
+<p>"Who are they?" Bristow asked, interested. "How do they happen to be
+working for you?"</p>
+
+<p>"They belong to a private bureau here, Golson's. Golson and I have worked
+together before."</p>
+
+<p>In the elevator Bristow was thinking that the matter of becoming a
+professional detective was not as simple as it had appeared to him. The
+work required colleagues, assistants, "shadowers," and reciprocal
+arrangements with bureaus in other cities. It was like any other
+profitable business, complicated, demanding constant attention.</p>
+
+<p>When they met at breakfast, Braceway had already received Platt's report.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing developed last night," he told Bristow. "Platt followed Morley,
+who went straight to his home. He and his mother live in a little house
+far out on R Street northwest. Morley took the street car and was home by
+a little after half-past eleven. The lights were all out by a quarter
+past twelve. This morning at six-thirty, when Delaney relieved Platt, our
+man hadn't left the house."</p>
+
+<p>"What's your guess about today?"</p>
+
+<p>"Either he'll go to the bank on time this morning, to throw off
+suspicion," said Braceway, "or, if he mailed the jewelry to himself here
+the night of the murder, he'll try to pawn them in Baltimore or at a
+pawnshop in Virginia, just across the river. There are no pawnshops in
+Washington. There's a law that interferes."</p>
+
+<p>"Delaney won't lose him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a chance."</p>
+
+<p>During the meal he saw that Bristow was completely worn out. As a matter
+of fact, he looked actually sick.</p>
+
+<p>"See here," Braceway said as they were ready to leave the table; "you
+look all in, done out."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow did not deny it.</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't sleep very well last night. It was close in my room, and this
+morning the humidity's oppressive. You know what that does to us of the
+T. B. tribe."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose you get some more rest. It's going to be a sweltering day."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I can stand it. I want to go with you. I'm not going to feel any
+worse than I do now."</p>
+
+<p>But the other was insistent. Bristow at last gave in. He would take the
+rest if Braceway would report progress to him at noon.</p>
+
+<p>Returning to his room, the sick man swore savagely.</p>
+
+<p>"Friday!" he said aloud. "Damn it all anyway!"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway lingered several minutes on the steps outside the Anderson
+National Bank. He felt reluctant to go inside and start the machinery
+that would ruin Morley. It wasn't absolutely necessary, he argued, with
+something like weakness; he could, perhaps, find out all he wanted to
+know without&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>He thought suddenly of the bizarre performances of the thing men call
+Fate. Because a woman is murdered under mysterious circumstances in a
+little southern city, evidence is uncovered showing that a panic-stricken
+boy has been stealing money from a bank hundreds of miles away; a
+detective is employed by the dead woman's husband; the detective is
+thrown again into contact with the victim's sister and realizes more
+clearly than ever that he loves her.</p>
+
+<p>What would be the result of it all&mdash;the result for him? He remembered the
+gown she had worn to a ball, something of the palest yellow&mdash;how the blue
+of her eyes and the gleam of her hair had been emphasized by the simple
+perfection of the gown. What would she say if he went back to&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>He forced himself down to reality.</p>
+
+<p>He entered the bank and discovered that Morley had not reported for work.
+Having presented his card to a chilly, monosyllabic little man, he was
+shown, after a short wait, into a private office where, surrounded by
+several tons of mahogany, Mr. Joseph Beale reigned supreme.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Beale struck him as a fattened duplicate of Mr. Illington, thin of
+lip, hard of eye, slow and precise in enunciation. In spite of his
+stoutness, he had the same long, slender fingers, easy to grasp with, and
+the same mechanical Punch-and-Judy smile. When he greeted the detective,
+his voice was like a slow, thin stream that had run over ice.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not on a pleasant mission, Mr. Beale," Braceway began. "It's
+something in the line of duty."</p>
+
+<p>The bank president looked at the card which had been handed to him.</p>
+
+<p>"Ahem!" he said, with a lip smile. "You're a detective?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Mr. Braceway, what is it? Let's see whether I can do anything for
+you. At least, I assume you want&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>This ruffled Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"I want nothing," he said crisply; "and I'm afraid I'm going to do
+something for you."</p>
+
+<p>The banker stiffened.</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's one of your employ&eacute;s; in fact, it's your receiving teller."</p>
+
+<p>"What! Henry Morley! Impossible, sir! Outrageous! Preposterous!"</p>
+
+<p>"Just a moment, if you please," put in Braceway. "I was going to say that
+I was positive about nothing. I've been compelled to suspect, however,
+that Mr. Morley might be short in his accounts. There are unexplained
+circumstances which seem to connect Mr. Morley with the murder of a
+woman. Therefore&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"One of the&mdash;one of my employ&eacute;s a thief and a murderer!" Mr. Beale pushed
+back his chair and fell to patting his knees with his fists. "Great God,
+Mr.&mdash;&mdash;" He looked at the card again. "Why, Mr. Braceway, I can't believe
+it. It would be treason to this bank, treason to all its traditions!" He
+had not suffered such an attack of garrulity for the past twenty years.
+"And Morley, his family, his birth! By George, sir, his blood! Are we to
+lose all faith in blood?"</p>
+
+<p>"As I wanted to say," Braceway managed to break in, "the murder of Mrs.
+George S. Withers in Furmville, North Carolina, led&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>This was the crowning blow. Mr. Beale gasped several times in rapid
+succession, not entirely hiding his slight, cold resemblance to a fish.</p>
+
+<p>"Mrs. Withers!" he got out at last. "The daughter of my old friend, Will
+Fulton! Fulton, one of our depositors!"</p>
+
+<p>He was reduced to silent horror.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway took advantage of his condition and outlined the circumstances
+in considerable detail.</p>
+
+<p>"If he's short in his accounts," he concluded, "the motive for the murder
+is established. And, if he's been stealing from the bank, you want to
+know it."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Beale pushed a bell-button.</p>
+
+<p>"Charles," he said to the chilly little man, "tell Mr. Jones I want to
+speak to him. Our first vice-president," he explained to Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Jones, evidently dressed and ready for the part of president of the
+bank whenever Mr. Beale should see fit to die, came in and, with frowns,
+"dear-dears" and tongue-clucking, heard from the president the story of
+what had befallen the Anderson National.</p>
+
+<p>"How soon," inquired Beale, "can we give this&mdash;er&mdash;gentleman an answer,
+a definite answer, as to whether Morley, the unspeakable scoundrel, is a
+thief?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Jones considered sadly.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps, very soon; two o'clock or something like that&mdash;and again it may
+take time to find anything. Suppose we say five or half-past five this
+afternoon; to be safe, you understand. Half-past five?"</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," agreed Beale, and turned to Braceway: "Will that be
+satisfactory?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perfectly."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway left them, their mask-like faces plainly damaged by anxiety;
+their cool, slow utterance slightly humanized by the realization that
+they must act at once. In fact, as the detective closed the door of the
+private office, Mr. Jones was reaching with long, slender fingers for the
+telephone. They would need the best accountant they could find for the
+quick work they had promised Braceway.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX</h2>
+
+<h3>THE DISCOVERY OF THE JEWELS</h3>
+
+
+<p>Braceway returned to the lobby of his hotel, and, having bought half
+a dozen New York newspapers, settled down to wait for a report from
+Golson's bureau concerning Morley's movements. A little after eleven he
+was called to the telephone.</p>
+
+<p>"Your man caught the eight o'clock train for Baltimore." Golson himself
+gave the information. "Delaney also caught it. They got to Baltimore
+at nine. Your man took a taxi straight to the shop of an old fellow named
+Eidstein, reaching there at twenty minutes past nine. He and Eidstein
+went into Eidstein's private office back of the shop and stayed there for
+over an hour, in fact until about half-past ten. Your man came out and
+went to a down-town hotel. He was there when Delaney, still sticking to
+him, managed to get a wire to me telling me what I've just told you."</p>
+
+<p>"Fine!" said Braceway. "What was he doing in the hotel? Did he meet
+anybody, or write anything?"</p>
+
+<p>"Delaney didn't say."</p>
+
+<p>"Who's this Eidstein, a pawn broker?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; he's a dealer in antiques: furniture, old gold, old jewels, anything
+old. He stands well over there. He's all right. I know all about him."</p>
+
+<p>"That's funny, isn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>"What's funny?"</p>
+
+<p>"That he didn't go to a pawnshop."</p>
+
+<p>"Keep your shirt on," laughed Golson. "The day's not over yet."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt about that. What about Corning, the loan-shark in Virginia?"</p>
+
+<p>"I've got a man over there, just as you asked. Shall I keep him on?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure!" snapped Braceway. "Suppose Morley gives Delaney the slip in
+Baltimore and doubles back to Corning's! Keep him there all day."</p>
+
+<p>He left the telephone and went up to Bristow's room, No. 717. When he
+knocked, the door was opened by a young woman in the uniform and cap
+of a trained nurse.</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon," he began, "I got the wrong room, I'm afraid. I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"This is Mr. Bristow's room," she said in a low tone. "Are you Mr.
+Braceway?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Come in, then, please." She stepped back and held open the door. "Mr.
+Bristow's still very weak, but he told me to let you in. He said he must
+see you as soon as you arrived."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway saw that there was no bed in the room, and asked where the sick
+man was. The nurse pointed to a closed door leading into the adjoining
+room.</p>
+
+<p>"What's the matter with him?" he asked. "By George! He hasn't had a
+hemorrhage, has he?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir. That's exactly what he has had. The doctor says all he needs
+now is rest. He doesn't think there's any real danger. Will you go in to
+see him?"</p>
+
+<p>She quietly opened the door to the sickroom. Braceway went in on tiptoes,
+but Bristow stirred and turned toward him when the nurse put up the
+window shade.</p>
+
+<p>"You'll have to lie still, Mr. Bristow," she cautioned on her way out.
+"It's so important to keep these ice-packs in place."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks, Miss Martin; I shall get on," he answered in a voice so weak
+that it startled Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you'd better talk," said his visitor. "Really, I
+wouldn't."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow gave him a wry smile.</p>
+
+<p>"It's nothing serious; just a&mdash;pretty bad hemorrhage," he said, finding
+it necessary to pause between words. "The boneheaded Mowbray&mdash;my
+physician in Furmville, you know&mdash;was right for once. He said&mdash;this might
+happen."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going out and let you sleep," Braceway insisted, displaying the
+average man's feeling of absolute helplessness in a sickroom.</p>
+
+<p>"No, not yet. The fellow I had in&mdash;knows his business&mdash;put ice on the
+lung and on my heart&mdash;gave me something to lessen the heart action."</p>
+
+<p>"And you're not in pain?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I'll be all right in&mdash;in a little&mdash;One thing I wanted to&mdash;tell you.
+Quite important&mdash;really."</p>
+
+<p>He mopped his forehead with tremulous, futile little dabs which
+accentuated his weakness. Braceway instinctively drew his chair closer
+to the bed so as to catch all of the scarcely audible words.</p>
+
+<p>"Just occurred to me," the sick man struggled on, "just&mdash;before I had
+this hemor&mdash;Ought to have somebody, extra man, working with Platt and
+Delaney. Tell you why: if Morley mailed the jewelry that&mdash;night of
+the murder, he wasn't fool&mdash;enough to mail it to himself or to his
+own&mdash;house. If he visits anybody today&mdash;we ought to have an extra man
+with Delaney. Delaney can keep on Morley's trail&mdash;extra man can watch
+and&mdash;if necessary, question anybody Morley visits or consults with.
+Then&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Correct!" exclaimed Braceway. "Right you are! Who says you're sick? Why,
+your bean's working fine. Don't try to talk any more. I'm going out to
+get busy on that very suggestion."</p>
+
+<p>"Another thing," Bristow said, lifting a feeble hand to detain his
+visitor. "Come up here at six&mdash;this evening, will you? I'll have my
+strength back by that time. Don't laugh. I will. I know I will. I've had
+hemorrhages before this."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you want to do at six?"</p>
+
+<p>"Help you&mdash;be with you when you question Morley. Promise me. I'll be in
+shape by that time."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway promised, and went into the outer room.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think," he asked Miss Martin, "there's the slightest chance of
+his getting up this evening, or tonight?"</p>
+
+<p>"I really don't know," she smiled. "There may be. It all depends on his
+courage, his nerve. Anyway, he won't be able to do much, to exert
+himself."</p>
+
+<p>"He's got the nerve," Braceway said admiringly; "got plenty of it. By the
+way, how did it happen? How do you happen to be here?"</p>
+
+<p>"It seems that at about a quarter to ten Mr. Bristow called the
+downstairs operator and asked her to send a bellboy to his room,
+number seven-seventeen. When the boy came in here, Mr. Bristow was
+lying across the foot of his bed, pressing to his mouth a towel that
+was half-saturated with blood.</p>
+
+<p>"He had dropped his saturated handkerchief on the bathroom floor. And he
+evidently had been bleeding when he was at the telephone. He was awfully
+weak, so weak that the boy thought he was dying. He couldn't speak. The
+boy remembered having seen the house physician, Dr. Carey, at a late
+breakfast in the caf&eacute;, and got him up here at once. Dr. Carey called me
+to take the case as soon as he had seen Mr. Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"I think that's all. Of course, the bed that was in here and all the
+other soiled things had been removed by the time I came in; and the
+management insisted on his taking the extra room."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," said Braceway. "I'm glad to get the details. You'll see that
+he has everything he needs, won't you?"</p>
+
+<p>A few minutes later, when Miss Martin entered the bedroom to lower the
+window shade, Bristow told her:</p>
+
+<p>"I think I'll sleep now. Shut the door and, on no account, let&mdash;anybody,
+doctor or anybody else&mdash;wake me up. You call me at six, please. What
+time is it now? Twelve-fifteen? Remember, you'll let me sleep?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway went to his own room to brush up for lunch. Although he had not
+taken the trouble to tell Bristow, he had already arranged with Golson to
+have the "extra man" on the job. He was taking no chances. He smiled when
+he thought of the sick man's eagerness to give him advice.</p>
+
+<p>It occurred to him that he should have communicated with George Withers.
+The funeral was over; had been set for yesterday. He would send him a
+wire as soon as he went downstairs.</p>
+
+<p>"By George!" Braceway communed with himself. "If I hadn't been his
+friend, I probably would have worried him. Even if Morley has embezzled
+from the bank, how closely have I coupled him with the crime? Not very
+closely unless he tries to pawn, or produces, some of the stolen
+stuff&mdash;not any more closely than George has coupled himself with it!
+George acted like such an ass!"</p>
+
+<p>He was about to leave the room when, for the first time, he looked the
+situation squarely in the face and made an important acknowledgment to
+himself. There had been in his mind, ever since that train had pulled out
+of Furmville with George's rattling whisper still sounding in his ear,
+the desire and the plan to safeguard George. He had felt, on this trip,
+that, if his theory about the case broke down, it might be advisable,
+even necessary, to produce all the evidence possible to shield his friend
+either from ugly gossip or from the down-right charge of murder. He did
+not believe for a moment that Withers was guilty.</p>
+
+<p>If things went wrong in the next eight or ten hours, if it was proved
+that Morley had nothing to do with the murder, the thing he wanted above
+all else was a story from Morley that he, Morley, had seen the struggle
+in front of No. 5 as Withers had described it. Somehow, that story about
+the struggle had struck him as the weakest link in George's whole story.</p>
+
+<p>He had resolutely refused to consider it up to now, but he no longer
+could dodge it. He had come to Washington to catch the criminal. But he
+also had come with the subconscious plan of getting at anything that
+would help Withers.</p>
+
+<p>He stood for an instant, jangling the room key in his hand. A frown drew
+his brows together. The frown deepened. He unlocked the door, went back
+into the room, and put down his cane, leaning it against the wall near
+the bureau.</p>
+
+<p>He reached the lobby in time to hear a callboy paging him. There was a
+telegram for him. It read:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Mr. S. S. Braceway, Willard Hotel, Washington, D. C.</p>
+
+<p>"Here.</p>
+
+<p>(Signed) "Frank Abrahamson."
+</p></div>
+
+<p>"What the devil does he mean?" he asked himself several times. "What's
+this 'here' about?"</p>
+
+<p>He thought a long time before he remembered having asked the Furmville
+pawn broker to try to recall where he had seen the bearded man in
+another disguise, a disguise which, apparently, had consisted of nothing
+but a black moustache and bushy eyebrows. And Abrahamson had promised
+to wire him if he did remember. The "here" meant it was in Furmville that
+he had seen the moustached man.</p>
+
+<p>He went to the telegraph desk and wrote out a message:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Mr. Frank Abrahamson, 329 College Street,
+Furmville, N. C.</p>
+
+<p>"Silence.</p>
+
+<p>(Signed) "Braceway."</p></div>
+
+<p>"One-word telegrams!" he smiled grimly. "Thrifty fellows, these chosen
+people."</p>
+
+<p>He found the telephone booths and called up Golson.</p>
+
+<p>"Got anything from Baltimore?" he inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"Just been talking to Delaney on long-distance," Golson answered without
+enthusiasm.</p>
+
+<p>"Well! What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Your man gave him the slip a quarter of an hour ago, and he wants&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Gave him the slip!" shouted Braceway. "What are you talking about?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't like it any more than you do," snapped Golson. "But that's what
+happened: gave him the slip."</p>
+
+<p>"How?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't get that exactly. Delaney merely said he lost him in the hotel.
+Your man was evidently waiting there for a message or phone call. If he
+received it, Delaney was fooled. Anyway, he's gone now; and Delaney wants
+to know what he's to do. What'll I tell him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Tell him to go to hell!" Braceway said hotly. "No! Tell him to go back
+to Eidstein's and wait there until Morley shows up. That's his only
+chance to pick him up again."</p>
+
+<p>"O.K.," growled Golson.</p>
+
+<p>"Say! Put somebody on the job of watching for the incoming trains from
+Baltimore, will you? Right away?"</p>
+
+<p>"Platt's just come into the office. I'll send him to the station at
+once."</p>
+
+<p>"What time did Delaney lose sight of Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>"Twelve forty-five."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway hung up the receiver and looked at his watch. It was ten minutes
+past one. He had fifty minutes to kill before keeping an appointment he
+had made with Major Ross, chief of the Washington police.</p>
+
+<p>After a quick lunch, he strolled over to the news-stand and picked up the
+early edition of an afternoon paper.</p>
+
+<p>The first headlines he saw were:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">STOLEN GEMS FOUND<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IN SUSPECT'S YARD<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Under these lines was a dispatch from Furmville giving the information
+that plain-clothes men of the Furmville police force had discovered the
+emerald-and-diamond lavalliere worn by Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers the night
+she was murdered. The jewelry had been found in the yard of the house
+where Perry Carpenter had lived. The lavaliere was concealed in tall
+grass immediately beneath the window of Carpenter's room, and thus had at
+first escaped the eyes of the police. When found, it was intact except
+for the six links that had been broken from the chain and dropped the
+night of the murder.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway threw down the paper and went to the Pennsylvania Avenue door.</p>
+
+<p>"Damn!" he addressed mentally the top of the Washington monument. "More
+grist for Bristow's mill! I'm not crazy, am I? I'm not that crazy, that's
+sure!"</p>
+
+<p>He set out to keep his appointment with Major Ross. After all, he felt
+reasonably sure of himself, and he had made up his mind to carry things
+through as he originally had intended. His shoulders were well back, his
+step elastic and quick. He flung off discouragement as if it had been an
+over-coat too warm for that weather.</p>
+
+<p>He would not permit Delaney's fiasco to annoy him. The Baltimore police
+had been tipped to watch the pawnshops; Delaney probably would pick
+Morley up again; and there was the extra man yet to be heard from.
+Besides, Morley would break down and confess cleanly after his fright on
+being arrested. Things were not so bad after all.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>CHAPTER XXI</h2>
+
+<h3>BRISTOW SOLVES A PROBLEM</h3>
+
+
+<p>Mr. Beale and Mr. Jones were, so far as their exteriors showed, nearly
+back to the normal iciness of their every-day appearance when Braceway
+found them in the president's office a few minutes after half-past five.
+He did not have to ask what they had discovered; their faces were frank
+confessions. He dropped into a chair and smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"How much?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Beale cleared his throat and moved his lips deliberately one against
+the other.</p>
+
+<p>"Before I say anything else, Mr.&mdash;er&mdash;Braceway, I want to express to you
+not only my own gratitude but that of all the officers and directors of
+the Anderson National. You have, it seems, saved us from great trouble.
+As things are, they are bad enough. But you have enabled us to put our
+fingers on the&mdash;ah&mdash;situation almost in time."</p>
+
+<p>He glanced at Jones.</p>
+
+<p>"Briefly," the vice-president took up the statement, "it has been
+established, thus far, that Morley has stolen from the Anderson National
+the&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Beale's composure broke down at this. He interrupted the
+subordinate's calm explanation:</p>
+
+<p>"Stolen from the Anderson National! Think of that, sir! Of all the
+outrageous things, of all the unqualifiedly and absolutely incredible
+things! We have in our bank, on our payrolls, a thief, an unmitigated
+scoundrel!" He pushed back his chair and drummed on his knees. "We find
+that one of his thefts was seven hundred dollars, and another five
+hundred. We&mdash;I&mdash;trusted him, trusted him! And with what result?"</p>
+
+<p>He slid his chair forward and bruised his fist by striking the desk with
+all his strength.</p>
+
+<p>"And the crudity of his methods! Preposterous! The old trick of entries
+in pass-books and no entries in the records! He chose, for his own
+safety, depositors who carried large balances and were not apt to draw
+out anywhere near their total balance. It's the most abominable&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Between the outbursts of the president and the cold, lifeless words of
+the vice-president, Braceway managed to elicit these facts: they expected
+to uncover more than the $1,200 shortage already established; when they
+could examine all the pass-books now out of the bank, the total would
+undoubtedly be found much larger; they demanded Morley's arrest at once;
+in fact, if the law had allowed it, they would have sent him to the
+scaffold within the next hour.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," the detective reminded them, "he's also under suspicion of
+murder."</p>
+
+<p>"My God!" spluttered Beale. "What do we care about murder? Hasn't he
+tried to murder this bank? Hasn't he assassinated, so far as he could,
+its good name? Get him! Put him behind the bars!"</p>
+
+<p>At last they agreed to Braceway's plan: Morley was to be arrested by one
+of Major Ross' plain-clothes men when he stepped off the train from
+Baltimore. It was to be done quietly, so that the news of it would not
+be in the morning's papers.</p>
+
+<p>He was then to be taken to one of the outlying police stations for the
+sake of privacy, was to be told that he was charged with embezzlement;
+and then, having been frightened by the arrest, he would be compelled to
+undergo the cross-examination of Braceway and Bristow, who wanted to
+prove or disprove his connection with the murder in Furmville.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway returned to the hotel to await a report from either Major Ross
+or Delaney.</p>
+
+<p>Delaney came into the lobby and joined him. They went straight to
+Braceway's room.</p>
+
+<p>"We caught the five o'clock in Baltimore and got here a little before
+six," the big man started his story. "One of the men from headquarters
+stepped up to him and arrested him. I figured you had arranged for it, so
+I beat it up here."</p>
+
+<p>"What happened in Baltimore?" asked Braceway in a tone so friendly that
+it dissipated much of the other's embarrassment.</p>
+
+<p>"I declare, Mr. Braceway," he said humbly, "I don't know how it happened.
+I never had such a thing hit me before. But I lost him slick as a
+whistle. I was in the bar of the hotel, and he was sitting in the lobby.
+I had my eye right on him, and he had no idea I was following him. Then,
+all at once, after I'd turned to the barkeeper just long enough to order
+a soft drink, I looked around, and he was gone. I combed the house from
+top to bottom, but it was no use. He had ducked me clean."</p>
+
+<p>"What time was that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Twelve-forty-five."</p>
+
+<p>"And then what?"</p>
+
+<p>"The chief gave me your message, and I went back to keep a look on
+Eidstein's place. I didn't think he'd show there again, but he did&mdash;at
+four o'clock and stayed there almost half an hour. After that, he went to
+the station, me right after him. We both caught the five o'clock for
+Washington."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you talk with Eidstein?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir; had no orders. But he's no loan-shark, and no fence. Eidstein's
+on the level. We know all about him."</p>
+
+<p>"How did Morley look when he showed up there the second time?"</p>
+
+<p>"Done up, sir, fagged out. That's what makes me uneasy. He'd been up to
+something that shook him, something that rattled his teeth. He looked
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"Pawning something, perhaps?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's just it&mdash;just the way I figured it&mdash;something he knew was
+risky&mdash;something that made him sweat blood."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it's all right," Braceway concluded. "There's nothing for you to
+worry about. It may be that losing him was the best thing you ever did.
+I'm not sure, but it may turn out so."</p>
+
+<p>Delaney, greatly relieved, thanked him and left.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway hurried to the sick man's room and, having been ushered in by
+Miss Martin, found him, fully dressed, sitting on the edge of the bed. He
+was still pale and looked tired, but his voice was strong. He was setting
+down a half-empty glass of water on a tray near the bed, and his hand,
+although it wavered a little, had lost the helpless tremulousness
+Braceway had noticed at noon.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello!" said the visitor. "You're a wonder! I expected to find you
+prostrated."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no," Bristow answered quietly. "I knew the rest and sleep would
+bring me around all right, and Miss Martin has given me a twentieth of a
+grain of strychnine. What's the news?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll sketch it to you. But how about dinner?"</p>
+
+<p>"I've arranged for us to have it up here, if you don't mind?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway agreed, and Miss Martin straightened up the other room, where
+the meal was served.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, restricting himself to clam broth, crackers, and coffee, heard
+the story of the day's developments with profound interest. Except for
+the little tremor in his fingers, there was no sign that he had been ill
+a few hours earlier. Not a detail escaped him. The whole thing was
+photographed on his mind, even the hours and minutes of the time at which
+this or that had occurred.</p>
+
+<p>"So," concluded Braceway, "you can see why I feel pretty fine! Morley's
+a thief, as I'd believed all along. The motive for the murder is
+established, particularly when you remember that Miss Fulton, who had
+been advancing him money, was prevented by her sister from doing so any
+further."</p>
+
+<p>"No; I can't see that," objected Bristow. "A motive? Yes; but not a
+motive for murder. So far as I can size it up, he wanted to steal more
+money, and that's all. It's a far cry between theft and murder."</p>
+
+<p>"You stick to your old theory, the negro's guilt?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naturally. There you have the motive and the murder&mdash;the proof that he
+said he would rob, and the indisputable evidence that he did rob and
+kill. Why, he brought away with him particles of the victim's body! What
+more do you want?"</p>
+
+<p>For a long moment their glances interlocked and held. In a sharp,
+intuitive way Braceway felt that Bristow suspected his concern about
+George Withers. He did not know why he suspected it, but he did. He was
+convinced that the other, with his darting, analytical mind, had gone to
+the secret unerringly.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, well," he laughed, rising from the table, "if you're so fond of your
+own ideas, Bristow, you won't be of much use to me in questioning Morley
+tonight."</p>
+
+<p>"On the contrary," the other returned quickly, "I'm just as anxious as
+you are to get the truth out of him. As long as one man's story is left
+vague and indefinite, just that long you run the risk of somebody's
+coming forward with facts or conjectures to overthrow the theory you've
+advanced. It applies to my idea as well as to yours."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt."</p>
+
+<p>"You know as well as I do," the lame man continued, "that, if Perry
+Carpenter isn't guilty, the next one to suspect logically is Withers."</p>
+
+<p>"What makes you say that?" The question was put sharply.</p>
+
+<p>"I've two reasons. In the first place, the facts and Withers' own story;
+in the second, common sense."</p>
+
+<p>The telephone rang. When Bristow answered it, a man's voice asked for
+Braceway. Major Ross himself was on the wire.</p>
+
+<p>"I had the man in Baltimore interviewed," he reported. "Here is his story
+in a few words: some years ago Morley's father bought from his shop a
+pair of earrings, each one set with an unusually valuable pigeon's-blood
+ruby, and gave them to Mrs. Morley. Young Morley, now in trouble, took
+him this morning the two stones and asked him to buy them back. He
+explained that it must be done secretly because he might be suspected of
+having been implicated in a murder.</p>
+
+<p>"He denied any guilt, but said it would embarrass him if the deal became
+known. The owner of the shop&mdash;you understand who&mdash;could not buy them
+back, but promised to raise money on them, something he'd never done
+before. He was greatly affected by Morley's grief and despair. He says
+the rubies are the ones he sold years ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Did he raise the money?"</p>
+
+<p>"He tried, but couldn't get the sum Morley wanted, seven hundred dollars.
+Finally, he did advance it from his own pocket."</p>
+
+<p>"And the stones? How do they compare with those on the list of Withers'
+stuff?"</p>
+
+<p>"Identical."</p>
+
+<p>"All right; thanks. We'll see you at eight."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway repeated the report to Bristow, eliciting the comment:</p>
+
+<p>"Is somebody trying to make fun of us&mdash;or what is it? If those rubies
+belonged to Mrs. Withers, one thing at least is certain: Morley was in
+the bungalow the night of the murder, and after the murder had been
+committed. Miss Fulton distinctly told me the only jewelry that had ever
+passed between her and Morley was the ring found in his room in the
+Brevord that morning."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway laughed aloud.</p>
+
+<p>"At last," he said, "You're beginning to see the light&mdash;or to appreciate
+the jungle we're running around in."</p>
+
+<p>He had arranged for them to meet Major Ross at the station house of
+No. 7 police precinct. Since it was off the principal beats of police
+reporters, Morley was detained there.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow went into his bedroom, where Miss Martin gave him another dose of
+strychnine. He asked her to await his return&mdash;not that he expected to be
+in need of her, he said, but just to be on the safe side. He waved aside
+Braceway's solicitousness about his strength.</p>
+
+<p>As they stepped into the corridor, a boy handed Braceway a telegram. He
+read it, and, without a word, handed it to Bristow. It said:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Two diamonds and two emeralds, unset, apparently part of Withers
+jewelry, pawned here about two-thirty this afternoon by medium-sized
+man; a little slim; black moustache; high, straight nose; bushy eyebrows;
+very thin lips; gray eyes; age between thirty and forty; weight 140
+pounds. Two pawnshops used. No trace of him yet."</p></div>
+
+<p>It was signed by the chief of the Baltimore plain-clothes force.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think of that?" asked Braceway, his voice hard.</p>
+
+<p>"This Morley," answered Bristow, his voice equally hard, "must have lost
+his mind."</p>
+
+<p>They went down and took a cab.</p>
+
+<p>"That description," the lame man was thinking, as they rolled through the
+streets toward the northwest part of the city, "fits Withers perfectly,
+except for the moustache and the colour of the eyes. But that's absurd.
+I'd like to&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He began again to wonder what, in addition to the capture of the guilty
+man, had brought Braceway to Washington. With his highly sensitized
+brain, he had received the impression that there was joined to the case
+some event or interest of which he had not the slightest inkling. How was
+Morley hooked up with the hidden phase of the affair? He intended to know
+all they knew about the whole business.</p>
+
+<p>If Morley knew the secret&mdash;there was Maria Fulton! Incredulous for a
+moment, he considered an entirely new idea. His incredulity vanished&mdash;and
+he knew!</p>
+
+<p>He lay back against the cab cushion and laughed, silently. His mirth
+grew. His laughter was almost beyond control. This was the thing that had
+bothered him, the "hidden angle" that had escaped him. He laughed until
+he shook. He had to put his hand to his mouth to prevent bursting into
+prolonged, riotous guffaws.</p>
+
+<p>That was it&mdash;Withers and Fulton, and Braceway of course, were afraid of
+Morley, afraid of what he might say; not about events of the night of
+the murder, but what he might reveal concerning&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>He struggled again with his consuming mirth. He saw now that he had
+handled everything exactly as it should have been handled.</p>
+
+<p>Now, more than ever before, he was interested in what the embezzler would
+say under their examination and cross-questioning. It was like a game in
+which he, Bristow, was the assured winner before even the first move was
+made. He knew already the very thing they were so intent on concealing.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXII" id="CHAPTER_XXII"></a>CHAPTER XXII</h2>
+
+<h3>A CONFESSION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Bristow, satisfied now that he had fathomed Braceway's reluctance to
+accept as final the case against Perry Carpenter, had not been the only
+one mystified by the detective's course. Practically every other
+detective and police official in the country was wondering what secret
+motive had impelled Braceway to keep public attention focused on the
+tragedy after a flawless case against the real murderer had been
+established.</p>
+
+<p>They knew that he was in the employ of the husband and father of the
+murdered woman, and that, therefore, his acts had the endorsement of her
+family. What, then, they asked, was the true situation back of the
+pursuit and persecution of the bank clerk, Henry Morley?</p>
+
+<p>What possible interest could they have in running him down, in ruining
+his standing? What contingency was powerful enough to compel their
+approval of Braceway's forcing the conclusion upon the mind of the public
+that an ugly scandal had touched Mrs. Withers?</p>
+
+<p>And this question, at first whispered in the gossip in Furmville, had
+crept into the newspaper dispatches. The result was a morbid curiosity
+generally, and, in the minds of many, a belief that Braceway would fasten
+the crime on Morley. There were, however, a few who took the position
+that Morley, even if he had not committed the murder, had knowledge of
+some fact or facts even more terrible than the crime itself.</p>
+
+<p>Major Ross awaited the two men in a large, bare-walled room on the second
+floor of the station house. The night was oppressively warm, and the
+tall, narrow windows were thrown open. Like Braceway, Bristow took off
+his coat, the absence of it showing plainly the outline of his heavy belt
+and steel brace.</p>
+
+<p>Morley was ushered in and given one of the plain, straight-backed chairs
+with which the room was furnished. The only other furniture was a deal
+table, behind which Braceway, Bristow, and Major Ross sat in lounging
+attitudes. The major, aside from his interest in the case, was there
+merely as a matter of courtesy, a compliment to Braceway's reputation.</p>
+
+<p>The prisoner, a few feet from them across the table, was suggestive of
+neither resistance nor mental alertness. Above his limp collar and
+loosened cravat, his face looked haggard and drawn. It was without a
+vestige of colour save for the blue shadows under his eyes. There was a
+tremor on his lips almost continuously.</p>
+
+<p>Once or twice throughout the whole interview, his eyes brightened
+momentarily with a hint of cunning or attempted cunning. Except for these
+few flashes, he was manifestly beaten, unnerved, suffering from a
+simultaneous desire and inability to weigh and ponder what he said.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway began, in quick, incisive sentences:</p>
+
+<p>"You're up against it, Morley. You know it as well as we do. And we don't
+want to trick you or bully you. We're only after the truth. If you'll
+tell the truth, it will help you and us. Will you give us a straight
+story?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," he answered dully, his hands folded, like a woman's, against his
+body.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway put more imperiousness into his voice.</p>
+
+<p>"You know you're under arrest for embezzlement, don't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And you did take money from the Anderson National Bank?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley squirmed and looked at each of the three in front of him before he
+replied to that.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," he said finally, swallowing hard, his voice high and strained.</p>
+
+<p>"Good! That's the sensible way to look at it," Braceway jogged him with
+rapid speech. "We needn't bother any more about that tonight. How about
+the jewelry you pawned in Baltimore today?"</p>
+
+<p>The prisoner licked his lips and fixed on Braceway a look that grew into
+a stare.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean the rubies?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes."</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't pawn them, and&mdash;and they were my mother's."</p>
+
+<p>"How about the diamonds and emeralds?"</p>
+
+<p>"I had no diamonds and emeralds."</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't! Where were you all the afternoon preceding the time you
+showed up at Eidstein's?"</p>
+
+<p>This was his first intimation that he had been watched. He hesitated.</p>
+
+<p>"Do I have to tell that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly. Why shouldn't you?"</p>
+
+<p>A film, like tears, clouded his weak eyes. His voice was disagreeably
+beseeching.</p>
+
+<p>"It would bring my mother into this," he objected, twining his fingers
+about each other and shuffling his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"You'll have to tell us where you were and what you did," Braceway
+persisted.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, very well," he said desperately; "I was in a room in the Emerson
+Hotel with&mdash;with my mother. And I was&mdash;I was confessing to her that I'd
+stolen from the bank. She knew I needed money. I had told her I'd been
+speculating, and needed some extra money for margins. She gave me the
+rubies from her earrings; and she followed me to Baltimore. If I couldn't
+raise the money on the rubies, she was to borrow it on our house. She
+owns that."</p>
+
+<p>He paused, on the verge of tears.</p>
+
+<p>"Buck up!" Braceway prodded him. "You confessed to her, did you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. At the last, somehow, I couldn't stand the idea of her giving up
+the last thing she had, but&mdash;but she would have done it."</p>
+
+<p>"Could she have mortgaged her home in Baltimore?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Mr. Taliaferro, A. G. Taliaferro, the lawyer, would have fixed it
+for her. He's a friend of the family&mdash;used to be of father's."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, about the emeralds and diamonds?" Braceway began another attack.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know what you mean."'</p>
+
+<p>"They belonged to Mrs. Withers."</p>
+
+<p>Morley shook his head impatiently.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know anything about them."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow took a hand in the questioning, flicking him and provoking him by
+tone and word. But neither he nor Braceway could get an admission, or any
+appearance of admission, that he knew anything about the Withers jewelry.</p>
+
+<p>Furthermore, he declared that his presence in the hotel, from the time
+Delaney had "lost" him until his second appearance at Eidstein's at four
+o'clock, could be established by the room clerk, two bellboys, and a maid
+at the Emerson, and by the lawyer, Taliaferro, with whom he had talked on
+the telephone while there with his mother.</p>
+
+<p>According to him, he had unwittingly evaded Delaney by the simple act of
+stepping into the elevator and going to the room where his mother, having
+reached Baltimore an hour later than he, was waiting to hear how he had
+fared in his interview with Eidstein.</p>
+
+<p>He had hoped, he said, to cover up the $700 shortage at the bank with the
+money obtained from the dealer in antiques, but, thinking of the risk of
+his mother's being impoverished, he had renounced at the last moment the
+plan of getting more money through the mortgage or sale of the home.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you happen to know that a man, clumsily disguised and answering to
+your description, pawned some of the Withers jewelry in Baltimore today?"
+Braceway asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Did he?" He looked blank.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. What do you know about it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I've already told you: not a thing."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway, recognizing the futility for the present of prolonging this
+line of inquiry, paused, looking at him thoughtfully.</p>
+
+<p>"If I pawned them," Morley added, without raising his eyes, "why wasn't
+the money found on me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't get too smart!" Bristow put in so roughly and suddenly that the
+prisoner started violently. "What we want is facts, not arguments!"</p>
+
+<p>The lame man leaned forward in his chair and made his voice sharp,
+provocative.</p>
+
+<p>"You're not as clever as you think you are. You lied when you made your
+statement about the night Mrs. Withers was murdered. Now, come through
+with that&mdash;the truth about it!"</p>
+
+<p>Morley, utterly bewildered, stared and said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"What did you do that night? Where were you?"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow left his chair and, going round the table, stood in front of
+Morley.</p>
+
+<p>"I told you that once. I wasn't anywhere near Manniston Road."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, you were! We've got proof of it. You <i>were</i> there!"</p>
+
+<p>"What proof?"</p>
+
+<p>"You're curious about that, are you? I thought you would be! For one
+thing, the imprint of your rubber shoe on the porch floor of Number
+Five&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No! No! I wasn't on the porch. I&mdash;&mdash;" He checked the words, realizing
+that he had betrayed himself.</p>
+
+<p>"Not on the porch?" Bristow caught him up. "Where, then? Where?" He
+limped a step nearer to the prisoner. "Out with it now! You <i>were</i>
+there! You were there!"</p>
+
+<p>He stood over Morley, conquering him by the sheer weight of his
+personality.</p>
+
+<p>"I wasn't on the porch."</p>
+
+<p>"All right&mdash;not on the porch. But where?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley looked up at him and, mechanically, pushed his chair back, as if
+he felt the need of more space. Bristow, in his shirt-sleeves, his right
+arm held up, continued to crowd against him, threatening him, commanding
+him to speak.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway was amazed by the intensity of Bristow's glance, the tautness
+of his body, the harsh authority in his voice. This man who had been ill
+a few hours before exhibited now a strength and a vitality that would
+have been remarkable in anybody. In him, under the circumstances, it was
+nothing short of marvellous.</p>
+
+<p>Morley could not withstand him.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know anything&mdash;anything worth while," he said weakly, trembling
+from head to foot. "I would have told it at the very&mdash;at the very first;
+only I thought it might keep me in Furmville too long. I wanted to get
+back here and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind about what you wanted!" Bristow's hand fell and gripped his
+shoulder painfully, shook him, brought him back to the main issue. "What
+did you see? That's what we want to know, every bit of it, all of it!"</p>
+
+<p>Morley flinched, trying to throw off Bristow's hand. The lame man stepped
+back.</p>
+
+<p>"All right," he said, "I'm not going to hurt you."</p>
+
+<p>Morley, having yielded, told his story hurriedly, with little pauses here
+and there, struggling for breath.</p>
+
+<p>"I did miss my train, the midnight," he began. "I really tried to catch
+it. But, when I found it was gone, I couldn't sleep. I was worried and
+frightened. This bank business was on my mind. I wanted to think." He
+forced a mirthless smile at that. "I couldn't think very straight, but
+I tried to. I couldn't do anything but see myself in jail, in the
+penitentiary, because of the bank.</p>
+
+<p>"I wandered around without paying any attention to where I was. I'd left
+my bags in the station. The first thing I knew, I was on Manniston Road,
+in front of Number Nine&mdash;your house. I felt tired, and I sat down on the
+bottom step. I had on a raincoat. It&mdash;it was pitch-dark there.</p>
+
+<p>"The two electric lights, the street lights, on that block were out&mdash;had
+burnt out, or something. The only light I could see was down at the
+corner, where Manniston Road goes into Freeman Avenue&mdash;and that didn't
+give any light where I was."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true," Bristow said sharply, "but, from where you sat, anybody
+going up or down the steps of Number Five would have been directly
+between you and the avenue light. Isn't that so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"All right&mdash;go ahead. What did you see?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley hitched back his chair still further. He had begun to perspire,
+and he kept running his fingers round his neck between flesh and collar.</p>
+
+<p>"It was raining," he went on, his voice strained and metallic, "a fine
+drizzle at that time, and this made a circle of light, a kind of bright
+screen around the avenue light. Things that happened on, or near, the
+steps of Number Five were silhouetted against that screen of light.</p>
+
+<p>"I'd been there just a little while when I noticed some kind of movement
+on the steps of Number Five. It was a man coming down the steps. He was
+very careful about it, and very slow; looked like a man on his tiptoes."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow maintained his attitude of hanging over him, urging him on,
+forcing him to talk. Braceway and Major Ross, their faces wearing
+strained expressions, bent forward in their chairs, catching every
+syllable that came from the prisoner.</p>
+
+<p>"He went down the steps and turned down Manniston Road, toward the
+avenue."</p>
+
+<p>"All right!" Bristow prompted. "What then?"</p>
+
+<p>"That was all there was to that. I just sat there. It looked funny to me,
+but I didn't follow him. I wondered what he'd been doing. I never thought
+about murder or&mdash;or anything like that. I swear I didn't!"</p>
+
+<p>He licked his lips and gulped.</p>
+
+<p>"I sat there, I don't know how much longer it was&mdash;pretty long, I
+suppose. I didn't keep my glance always toward Number Five.</p>
+
+<p>"When I did look that way again, I saw another man come down the steps
+quietly, very cautiously. He turned toward me, but he came only far
+enough up to cut in between Number Five and Number Seven. He disappeared
+that way, between the two houses."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you see the struggle?" Braceway asked sharply.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow scowled at the interruption.</p>
+
+<p>"What struggle?" Morley retorted, vacant eyes turned toward Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"You know! The struggle between two men at the foot of the steps of
+Number Five."</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't see a struggle," said Morley. "There wasn't any."</p>
+
+<p>"You might as well tell it straight now as later. Give me the truth about
+that struggle. Were you in it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, see here! We know such a struggle occurred. If you were there, as
+you say you were, you must have seen it. You couldn't have helped seeing
+it!"</p>
+
+<p>Morley denied it again, and his denial stood against all of Braceway's
+skill. There had been no struggle, no encounter of any two persons. He
+clung to that without qualification.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow knew how great Braceway's disappointment was. He was convinced
+that Braceway, in coming to Washington, had looked forward to securing
+a confirmation of Withers' story. Now, instead of corroboration, he got
+only a flat and unshaken contradiction.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXIII"></a>CHAPTER XXIII</h2>
+
+<h3>ON THE RACK</h3>
+
+
+<p>Braceway waved his hand carelessly, relinquishing the post of questioner.
+Bristow took command again.</p>
+
+<p>"What did you do after you saw the second man?"</p>
+
+<p>"At first, I sat still. After a while, not very long, it occurred to me
+that the two women in Number Five might be in danger. I say it occurred
+to me, but I didn't really think so.</p>
+
+<p>"I walked down to the bungalow, but I couldn't hear any noise, couldn't
+see any light. Finally, I went up to the head of the steps and listened,
+but there wasn't a sound. Then I went back to the hotel&mdash;no; I went first
+to the station, got my grips, and then went to the hotel."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't murder or robbery occur to you when you saw those two men on the
+steps?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;no; I can't say either occurred to me."</p>
+
+<p>"What did, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"I knew Withers had visited his wife unexpectedly once or twice before,
+late at night."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I thought he was jealous, suspicious."</p>
+
+<p>"And you also thought these two men you saw were Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>"They might have been one man, the same man," Morley advanced the
+supposition wearily. The tremor of his hands had gone into his arms; they
+jerked every few moments. "I saw them at different times.</p>
+
+<p>"I couldn't see that clearly. But&mdash;but I think the first one wore a long
+raincoat, or else he was heavily built. Hearing about the negro the next
+day, I thought the first figure I'd seen must have been the negro's. The
+second didn't look very different. He might have had a beard; perhaps, he
+was a little slenderer. Those are the only differences I remember."</p>
+
+<p>"Did the second wear a raincoat?"</p>
+
+<p>"I thought so."</p>
+
+<p>"And the first had no beard?"</p>
+
+<p>"He might have, but I don't think so."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow paused long enough to let the silence become impressive. Then he
+broke the stillness with a voice that cracked sharp as a revolver shot.</p>
+
+<p>"Well! What about the struggle at the foot of the steps?"</p>
+
+<p>Morley, startled by the unexpected abruptness, answered shakily.</p>
+
+<p>"I tell you I&mdash;I didn't see any struggle. That man, or those men, tried
+not to make any noise at all. He thought nobody saw him."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway took a hand again in the examination, but their combined efforts
+got nothing further from the tired prisoner.</p>
+
+<p>They tried to shake him with the accusation that he had entered the
+bungalow Monday night; they told him also they might take him back to
+Furmville at once, charged with the murder.</p>
+
+<p>"It wouldn't make any difference to me," he said, making a weak attempt
+to laugh. "It wouldn't matter now. I'm not anxious to live anyhow."</p>
+
+<p>Without warning, utter collapse struck him. He flung himself half-around
+on his chair so that his arms rested on its back, cradling his face. His
+body was contorted by gasping sobs, and his feet tapped the floor with
+the rapidity of those of a man running at top speed.</p>
+
+<p>They left him with Major Ross. On the way back to the hotel, Bristow
+asked:</p>
+
+<p>"What about Withers' story of his struggle&mdash;the 'big, strong man' who
+flung him down the walk?"</p>
+
+<p>"There must have been another, a third man who came down the steps,"
+Braceway answered quietly.</p>
+
+<p>"An assumption," observed Bristow, "which rather strains my credulity."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"I believe," Bristow spoke up again, "what the fellow said tonight was
+true&mdash;substantially true."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you?" retorted Braceway, thoroughly non-committal.</p>
+
+<p>"Anyway there remains the problem of who pawned the Withers emeralds and
+diamonds this afternoon."</p>
+
+<p>"It may not be a problem," said Braceway. "It may be that they weren't
+the Withers stuff at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! I hadn't thought of that."</p>
+
+<p>They entered the hotel and sat down in the lobby, now almost deserted.</p>
+
+<p>"I think," Bristow announced, careful to keep any note of triumph out of
+his voice, "I'll go back to Furmville in the morning." He yawned and
+stretched himself. "I'm about all in, weak as a kitten. What are you
+planning?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway's chin was thrust forward. He looked belligerent, angry.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to Baltimore tomorrow. I intend to run down every clue I have
+or can find. I'm going to take up every statement he made tonight and
+dissect it&mdash;every point. I want all the facts&mdash;all of them."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow turned so as to face him squarely.</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you go back with me? Why keep on fighting what I've proved?
+I think I know why you came to Washington. It wasn't your belief in
+Morley's guilt. It was your desire to clear Withers. But you know as well
+as I do that Withers isn't guilty. So, why worry?"</p>
+
+<p>Braceway sprang to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Morley isn't out of the woods yet," he said grimly. "This case isn't
+settled yet, by a long shot. I'm going to stick right here."</p>
+
+<p>He made no reference to Withers.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow went to his room, paid and dismissed Miss Martin, and began to
+undress. He was more than satisfied with everything that had happened.
+He had bested Braceway again, this time finally; his reputation as a
+"consulting detective" was more than safe; and, knowing now why Braceway
+had pursued Morley, he would return to Furmville in the morning, his mind
+thoroughly at ease.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXIV"></a>CHAPTER XXIV</h2>
+
+<h3>MISS FULTON WRITES A LETTER</h3>
+
+
+<p>As long as the public's morbid curiosity clamoured for details of the
+case, the newspapers provided them lavishly. This curiosity was
+intensified by two things: first, the search for a murderer after so much
+almost convincing evidence had been found against the negro, and, second,
+the duel between Bristow, the amateur, and Braceway, the professional,
+each bent on making his theory "stand up." The amateur had achieved far
+more celebrity than he had expected.</p>
+
+<p>It would have been hard to find two men less alike than he and Braceway.
+Bristow was capable now and then of manifesting the strength and
+impressive authority he had exhibited in his questioning of Morley.
+Braceway, on the other hand, was always keyed up, dashing, imperious. And
+he had a kindness of heart, a very live tenderness, such as the lame man
+never displayed.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway was of the tribe of dreamers.</p>
+
+<p>He had learned that no man may hope to be a great detective unless he
+has imagination, unless he can throw into the dark places which always
+surround a mysterious crime the luminous and golden glow of fancy. He had
+found also that, if a man's vocabulary is without a "perhaps" or a "but
+why couldn't it be the other way?" he will never be able to judge human
+nature or to consider fairly every side of any question.</p>
+
+<p>He discussed these views at breakfast with Bristow, who was interested
+only in his own decision of the night before to return at once to
+Furmville.</p>
+
+<p>"My health demands it," he said; "and I can't convince myself that either
+you or I can dig up anything here to affect the final outcome of the
+case."</p>
+
+<p>"You're right about the health part of it; I'm not sure about the other,"
+said Braceway.</p>
+
+<p>"What are you after, though?" Bristow pressed him.</p>
+
+<p>"Facts. That bearded man with the gold tooth, the fellow who always
+started from nowhere and invariably vanished into thin air&mdash;I don't
+propose to assume that he had nothing to do with the murder of Enid
+Withers. I don't intend to be recorded as not having combed the country
+for him if necessary.</p>
+
+<p>"That disguised man is no myth. And Morley knows all about beard
+'make-up.' His note to me in Furmville proved that. The negro boy, Roddy,
+swears Morley and the mysterious stranger are the same.</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't a crook living who can put it over on me this way with a
+cheap disguise. And this case isn't cleared up until, in some way, I find
+out who he is or get my hands on him." His voice was vibrant with the
+intensity of his feeling. "I'm going to find him! I intend to answer, to
+my own satisfaction, two questions."</p>
+
+<p>"What are they?"</p>
+
+<p>"The first is: was the bearded man Morley? The second: if Morley wasn't
+the bearded man, who was?"</p>
+
+<p>"But, if you do find this hirsute individual, what then? What becomes of
+the unassailable evidence against the negro?"</p>
+
+<p>"That will come later. Today I'm going to Baltimore. I've a report
+already, this morning, from Platt. He went over there last night. Morley,
+I find, deceived us again last night. He said nothing of leaving the
+hotel to call on the lawyer, Taliaferro.</p>
+
+<p>"As a matter of fact, he did visit Taliaferro.</p>
+
+<p>"He called the lawyer on the telephone at twenty minutes past two and
+said he would go at once to his office. If he had done so, he would have
+arrived there at twenty-four minutes past two. He reached there, in fact,
+at two-fifty, ten minutes of three. A half-hour of his time isn't
+accounted for. He left the hotel at two-twenty-one. Where did he spend
+that last half-hour? It's an interesting point."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Bristow said, surprised. "Pawnshops?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps&mdash;two pawnshops."</p>
+
+<p>"And the pawned diamonds and emeralds are certainly the Withers stuff, a
+part of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sure of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Anyway you look at it," Bristow smiled pleasantly, his manner tinged
+with patronizing, "you've a hard job to get away with."</p>
+
+<p>"If," the other ruminated, "the jewels pawned yesterday were not Mrs.
+Withers', why wouldn't the man who pawned them come forward and say so?
+If there wasn't anything crooked about them, why should he hide himself?
+The papers are full of it this morning. It's public property."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, looking at his watch, saw that it was nine o'clock and time for
+him to go to the railroad station.</p>
+
+<p>They said good-bye, each confident that the other was on the wrong trail.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm leaving you," the lame man declared, "to run to your heart's content
+around the clever circles you've outlined, and to beat off the newspaper
+reporters."</p>
+
+<p>"It's not for long," Braceway returned seriously. "I hope to be in
+Furmville next week with an armful of new facts. I'll see you then."</p>
+
+<p>He went to the desk and got his mail. In addition to reports from his
+Atlanta office, there was one letter in a big, square envelope. He
+recognized the writing and opened that first.</p>
+
+<p>"Dear Mr. Braceway," it said: "I hope Mr. Bristow repeated to you
+everything I told him. He is quite brilliant, I have no doubt, but I
+talked to him in the belief and hope that he would tell you everything.
+I know what you can do, and I trust you more than I do him. You see, you
+have successes behind you.</p>
+
+<p>"If he did not tell you all, I shall be glad to do so at any time."</p>
+
+<p>It was signed, "Sincerely yours, Maria Fulton."</p>
+
+<p>He read the note twice. When he put it into his pocket, there was a new
+light in his eyes, and at the corners of his mouth a relaxation of the
+lines of sternness.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder&mdash;&mdash;" he began in his thoughts, and added: "Some other time,
+perhaps. No; surely. I always knew her better than she knew herself."</p>
+
+<p>He was frankly happy, felt himself uplifted, freshened in spirit.
+Standing there in the crowded lobby, with people brushing past him and
+jogging his elbow, he flashed back two years in memory to the evening
+when he had warned her not to let the sweetness of her personality be
+overshadowed by her sister. It was then that he had insisted on her
+living her own life instead of giving up to the wishes of others always.</p>
+
+<p>She had misconstrued it, deciding that he was disappointed in her. She
+said his love for her had lessened, and therefore their engagement was a
+great mistake.</p>
+
+<p>Then came her promise to marry Morley, a promise made in pique.
+Afterwards she had done everything possible to show the world she had
+chosen a man instead of a weakling. This, Braceway knew, was why she had
+advanced him money, bolstering up one mistake with another. It was why
+she had listened to his stories of getting great wealth, if only he had a
+small amount of money to start on!</p>
+
+<p>What a fiasco the whole thing had been, what bitter disappointment and
+sorrow! And yet, she had been fortunate in discovering now what he was.</p>
+
+<p>There was no doubt about it, Braceway decided; she had loved him,
+Braceway, all this time. In a few days he would tell her so, make her
+confess it. He would compel her to listen to what he had to say; he would
+never again jeopardize their happiness by allowing her to misunderstand
+him.</p>
+
+<p>He crossed the lobby with long, springy strides. He felt that he could
+encounter no obstacle too great for him to overcome. Failure could not
+touch him.</p>
+
+<p>He left the hotel and went to Golson's office. He had much to do in
+Baltimore&mdash;and elsewhere.</p>
+
+<p>Hurrying to the station after a brief conference with Golson, he wondered
+why he had heard nothing from Withers. What was the matter with George
+anyhow? Why hadn't he acknowledged the telegram of yesterday? Couldn't he
+realize, without being told, that he might be charged with the murder at
+any moment?</p>
+
+<p>Braceway was as well aware as Bristow of the rising flood of criticism
+against Withers.</p>
+
+<p>"If I can't bring things to a last show-down within a day or two," he
+looked the situation squarely in the face, "it will be uncomfortable for
+him&mdash;emphatically uncomfortable."</p>
+
+<p>He turned to a study of the questions he wanted to put to Eidstein, this
+kindly old merchant who was so considerate, so handsomely considerate,
+about buying back jewels he had once sold. Mr. Eidstein, he felt sure,
+must be an interesting character.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXV" id="CHAPTER_XXV"></a>CHAPTER XXV</h2>
+
+<h3>A MYSTIFYING TELEGRAM</h3>
+
+
+<p>Reaching Furmville early Sunday morning, Bristow went straight to his
+bungalow, where Mattie had breakfast waiting for him.</p>
+
+<p>"You is sholy some big man now, Mistuh Bristow!" she informed him. "Sence
+you been gawn, folks done made it a habit to drive by hyuh jes' foh de
+chanct uv seem' you."</p>
+
+<p>Before the day was over, he found that this was true. And he liked it. He
+spent a great deal of his time on the front porch, finding it far from
+unpleasant to be regarded as a second Sherlock Holmes.</p>
+
+<p>Late in the afternoon his Cincinnati friend, Overton, called on him,
+puffing and gasping for breath as he climbed the steps. Bristow was glad
+to see him; it afforded him an opportunity to discuss his success. He did
+not try to delude himself in that regard; he was proud of what he had
+accomplished&mdash;rightfully proud, he told himself&mdash;and pleased with his
+plans for the future.</p>
+
+<p>"Gee whiz!" the fat man panted. "This hill is something fierce. It's only
+your sudden dash into the limelight that drags me up here."</p>
+
+<p>"You behold"&mdash;Bristow softened his statement with a deprecating
+laugh&mdash;"Mr. Lawrence Bristow, a finished, honest-to-heaven detective,
+a criminologist."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to make it my profession. I'm starting out as a professional
+detective."</p>
+
+<p>Overton burst into bubbling laughter.</p>
+
+<p>"That's rich!" he exclaimed. "You'd never in the world make good at it.
+Why, Bristow, you're lame; you've a crooked nose; that heavy, overhanging
+lip of yours&mdash;those things would enable any crook to spot you a mile
+off." He laughed again. "I'd like to see you shadowing some foxy
+second-story worker!"</p>
+
+<p>"I said 'a consulting detective'," Bristow corrected him. "That shadowing
+business is for the hired man, the square-toed, bull-necked cops. I'll
+work only as the directing head, the brains of the investigations."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that's different," said Overton, at once conciliatory. "That's
+nearer real sense. Big money in it, isn't there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I'm not an eleemosynary institution yet."</p>
+
+<p>Overton mopped his fat cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, me!" he sighed. "We never know what's ahead of us, do we? A year ago
+you were dubbing around in Cincinnati trying to sell real estate and
+working out crime problems on paper&mdash;and here you are now, a big man.
+It's hard to believe."</p>
+
+<p>"It is, however, a very acceptable fact."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt, no doubt," assented the fat man.</p>
+
+<p>On Overton's heels came the chief of police. After getting a minute
+recital of what had happened in Washington and Baltimore, he agreed that
+Braceway was only setting up straw men for the pleasure of knocking them
+down.</p>
+
+<p>"Even if there is something mysterious in Morley's conduct, in what
+occurred in Baltimore," said the chief, "it can't do away with the
+open-and-shut fact that Perry did the murder."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," Bristow commented. "But what's the news with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"For one thing, Perry gave us last night what he calls a confession. In
+it he says he did tell Lucy Thomas he knew where he could get money 'or
+something just as good'; he did go to Number Five in a more or less
+drunken condition; and he got as far as the front door.</p>
+
+<p>"There, he says, he thought he heard a noise across the road from him,
+and he lost his nerve. He tiptoed down the steps and went away, passing
+in between Number Five and Number Seven. He ran all the way back to
+Lucy's house, threw down the key he had got from her, and then went
+to his own rooming-house. He says he stayed there the rest of the night."</p>
+
+<p>"Is that all?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's all."</p>
+
+<p>"How about the lavalliere? Wasn't it found under his window? The papers
+said so."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; in the grass in the yard. But he denies knowing anything about it."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course! And his confession is nothing but a confirmation of the case
+against him."</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly. He seems to want to hang himself. And he'll do it. The grand
+jury meets next Thursday. He'll be indicted then, and tried two weeks
+later."</p>
+
+<p>"What are the people here saying about Braceway's bitterness against
+Morley? Anything?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I'd meant to tell you about that. Some of the gossip hits Withers
+pretty hard. They can't understand what's behind this persecution of
+Morley after it's been proved that Perry did the murder. You've seen
+hints of it in the papers.</p>
+
+<p>"And it looks queer. Some say Withers is guilty, out-and-out guilty, and
+afraid the case against Perry won't hold good. So, they say, he wants to
+get a case against Morley."</p>
+
+<p>"A sort of second line of defense?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon so. But, then, there are others saying right now that Morley
+was mixed up in some sort of scandal for which Withers wants revenge.
+That's what you said at the very start. Remember?"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow laughed softly.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I had that idea, and I've reasoned it out. On the way to
+Washington, and after we got there, I saw that Braceway wasn't entirely
+frank with me. You know how a man can feel a thing like that. He gets it
+by intuition.</p>
+
+<p>"And it worried me. Having handled the case here, I didn't want him to
+spring some brand new angle which possibly, in some way, might make me
+look like a fool.</p>
+
+<p>"I puzzled over the thing a whole lot. What was it he was after without
+letting me in on it? The night we talked to Morley in the station house,
+I got it. We were in a cab at the time, a lucky thing, because, when it
+burst upon me, I narrowly escaped hysterics. The thing came to me like an
+inspiration.</p>
+
+<p>"Braceway was afraid Morley knew something detrimental to Withers and
+would spring it under questioning. Understand now: it wasn't directly
+connected with the murder, but something that would make it pretty hot
+for Withers. And here was the laugh: while Morley didn't know it, I did.
+Braceway had made the trip to gag Morley, to see that he didn't uncover
+something which, after all, Morley didn't know&mdash;and I did!</p>
+
+<p>"It was this: about nine months ago Mrs. Withers, while in Washington,
+got a lawyer, the firm of Dutton &amp; Dutton, to draw up for her the
+necessary papers for suing Withers for a divorce. In these documents she
+set forth in so many words that her husband had treated her with the
+utmost brutality, so much so that she lived daily in danger of death
+while under his roof.</p>
+
+<p>"She regarded him, she swore, as capable of murdering her at any time.
+Now, do you see? If that had gotten into the newspapers, if Morley had
+known of it through Maria Fulton and had blurted it out, no power on
+earth could have kept down the very reasonable assumption that Withers
+had had a hand in his wife's death&mdash;or, at least, had regarded it with
+complaisance.</p>
+
+<p>"No wonder I laughed, was it? But I said nothing about it to Braceway. I
+couldn't have explained to him how I knew it, although the tip came to me
+straight enough. And, as there's no earthly chance of Withers having been
+implicated in the crime, why worry about it?</p>
+
+<p>"I merely laughed and&mdash;kept quiet."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf had listened in great solemnity to this amusing recital.</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe you're right," he said. "But Withers has done some funny things."</p>
+
+<p>"What things?"</p>
+
+<p>"His wife was buried in Atlanta Thursday morning. He immediately left
+Atlanta, and hasn't been seen or heard of since&mdash;a sharp contrast to old
+Fulton. He got back here early Friday morning and came up to Number Five.
+They're going to keep that bungalow."</p>
+
+<p>"When did Withers leave Atlanta?"</p>
+
+<p>"Thursday morning, right after the funeral. Another thing: he's heels
+over head in debt."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what about it? What are you driving at?" Bristow asked,
+perceptibly irritable.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not driving at anything. What's it to us anyway? It stimulates this
+ugly talk. That's all."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow was doing some quick thinking. If Withers had left Atlanta
+early Thursday morning, he might have reached Washington by Friday
+afternoon&mdash;and gone to Baltimore! But did he? And did Braceway know of it
+and keep it to himself?</p>
+
+<p>He recalled that Braceway, during their breakfast together in Washington,
+had said:</p>
+
+<p>"Get one thing straight in your mind, Bristow. Any man I find mixed up in
+this murder I'm going to turn over to the police. If I thought George
+Withers had killed his wife, I'd hand him over so fast it would make your
+head swim. You may not believe that, but I would&mdash;in a second!"</p>
+
+<p>Had that been a prophecy? Was Withers in Baltimore at two-thirty Friday
+afternoon? Could he have been fool enough to pawn anything? Or did he go
+there in the hope of incriminating Morley further? All these things were
+within the realm of possibility, but hardly credible. Braceway might have
+known of them, and he might not.</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson, he remembered, had put it into Braceway's head, against
+Braceway's own desire, that the man with the gold tooth and Withers
+resembled each other. But nobody believed that. It would be futile to
+consider it.</p>
+
+<p>The chief, as if reading his thoughts, gave more information:</p>
+
+<p>"Abrahamson, the loan-shark, came to my office yesterday; wanted to know
+where he could reach Braceway by wire. He evidently knew something and
+wouldn't tell me. Said he wired yesterday morning to Braceway in
+Washington, but the telegraph company reported 'no delivery'&mdash;couldn't
+locate him. I wonder what the Jew knows."</p>
+
+<p>"It's too much for me." Bristow dismissed the question carelessly, but
+immediately flared up peevishly: "What's getting into these fellows? They
+act like fools, each of them, Morley and Withers, following Perry's lead
+and trying to have themselves arrested! But Braceway&mdash;if he wasn't in
+Washington, he must be on his way back here. We'll soon have his last say
+on the case."</p>
+
+<p>"All the same," said Greenleaf, "if I were in that husband's place, I'd
+stay away from here. The talk's too bitter; worse here among the
+Manniston Road people than anywhere else."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"It wouldn't be the first instance of how easy it is for an innocent man
+to be&mdash;well, hurt."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that sort of thing is out of the question, absurd."</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind! I'd stay away. That's what I'd do."</p>
+
+<p>It was almost dark when the chief of police took his departure. Bristow
+sat watching the last crimson light fade over the mountains. The dim
+electric, a poor excuse for a street lamp, had flashed on in front of
+No. 4. The shadows grew deeper and deeper; there was no breeze; the oaks
+along the roadside and in the backyards became still, black plumes above
+the bungalows.</p>
+
+<p>Manniston Road was wrapped in darkness. The silence was broken, even at
+this early hour, only by the distant, faint screech of street-car wheels
+against the rails, or the far sound of an automobile horn down in the
+town, or the rattle of a sick man's cough on one of the sleeping porches.
+There was something uncanny, Bristow thought, in the velvet blackness and
+the heavy silence.</p>
+
+<p>He got up and went into the living room, turning on the lights. The
+night, the stillness, had affected him. Perhaps, he thought, Withers
+after all would do well to give Furmville a wide berth. If disorganized
+rumour grew into positive accusation&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>And what of himself, Bristow? He had run down the guilty man, had
+discovered and hooked together the facts that made retribution almost an
+accomplished thing. Could he have been mistaken, entirely wrong? Would
+public opinion turn also against him and say he had enmeshed an innocent
+negro instead of bringing to punishment a jealousy-maddened husband?</p>
+
+<p>Was there a chance that, in condemning Withers, they would destroy his
+reputation for brilliant work?</p>
+
+<p>Pshaw! He shrugged his shoulders. He was worse than the gossiping women,
+letting himself conjure up weird and incredible ideas. There was not a
+weak place, not an illogical point, in the case he had disclosed against
+Carpenter. He had won. His prestige was assured. Far from questioning his
+work, they ought to thank him for&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>The reverie was interrupted by the telephone bell. He took down the
+receiver and shouted "Hello!" as if he resented the call. His irritation
+showed what a tremendous amount of nervous energy he had expended in the
+last six days.</p>
+
+<p>"Western Union speaking," said a man's voice. "Telegram for Mr. Lawrence
+Bristow, nine Manniston Road."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. This is Bristow. Read it to me."</p>
+
+<p>"Message is dated today, Washington, D. C.&mdash;'Mr. Lawrence Bristow, nine
+Manniston Road, Furmville, N. C. See Encyclopaedia Britannica, volume
+one, page five hundred and six, second column, line fifteen to line
+seventeen, and page five hundred and seven, second column, line seventeen
+to line twenty-three.' Signed 'S. S. Braceway,' Do you get that?"</p>
+
+<p>"No! Wait a minute," he called out sharply. "Let me get a pencil and take
+it down."</p>
+
+<p>He did so, verifying the numbers by having the operator repeat the
+message a third time. When he had hung up the receiver, he sat staring at
+what he had written. It was like so much Greek to him.</p>
+
+<p>"What's it all about?" he puzzled. "Is it one of Braceway's jokes?"</p>
+
+<p>Then he remembered that Braceway was not that kind of a joker. He looked
+at his watch. He had no encyclopaedia, and it was now a quarter to
+eleven, too late to ring up anybody and ask the absurd favour of having
+extracts from an encyclopaedia read to him over the telephone. Besides,
+it might be something he would prefer to keep to himself.</p>
+
+<p>He would wait until morning and go to the public library where he could
+look up the references with no questions asked. He was annoyed by the
+necessity of delay, angry with Braceway. He studied the numbers again,
+and allowed himself the rare luxury of an outburst of vari-coloured
+profanity.</p>
+
+<p>The idea uppermost in his mind was that the telegram had to do with
+Withers&mdash;or could it be something about Morley?</p>
+
+<p>In his bed on the sleeping porch, he looked out at the black plumes of
+the trees. The silence seemed now neither sinister nor oppressive. All
+that was sinister was in the past; had ended the night of the murder; and
+Carpenter would go to the chair for it&mdash;sure.</p>
+
+<p>And yet, if he were Withers, he would not come back to Manniston Road.
+Nobody could foresee what Braceway might imagine and exaggerate, even
+if it indicted and condemned his closest friend.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXVI"></a>CHAPTER XXVI</h2>
+
+<h3>WANTED: VENGEANCE</h3>
+
+
+<p>But the next morning was the crowded beginning of the biggest day in
+Bristow's life, and the trip to the library was delayed. The hired
+automobile was waiting in front of No. 9 when a second telegram came,
+a bulky dispatch, scrawled with a pen across several pages. Dated from
+New Orleans, it read:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Reward of five thousand dollars for discovery of my seven-year-old son
+within next six days. Kidnapped last Friday night. No clue so far. Am
+most anxious for your help. Will pay you two thousand dollars and
+expenses and in addition to that will pay you the reward money if you are
+successful. Will pay the two thousand whether you succeed or not. City
+and state authorities will give you all the help needed. Come at once if
+possible. Wire answer.</p>
+
+<p>(Signed) "Emile Loutois."</p></div>
+
+<p>It was characteristic of Bristow that he was not particularly surprised
+or elated by the request for his services. It was the kind of thing he
+had foreseen as a result of the advertising he had received.</p>
+
+<p>He made his decision at once. For the past two days the Loutois
+kidnapping had commanded big space in the newspapers, and he was familiar
+with the story. Emile Loutois, Jr., young son of the wealthiest sugar
+planter in Louisiana, had been spirited away from the pavement in front
+of his home. It had been done at twilight with striking boldness, and no
+dependable trace of the kidnappers had been found.</p>
+
+<p>The delivery boy was waiting on the porch. Bristow typewrote his reply on
+a sheet of note paper:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Terms accepted. Starting for New Orleans at once."</p></div>
+
+<p>On his way to the door, he stopped and reflected. He went back to the
+typewriter and sat down. He had not yet found out the real meaning of the
+Braceway message; and he did not propose to leave Furmville until he was
+assured that nothing could be done to blur the brightness of his work on
+the Withers case.</p>
+
+<p>He realized, and at the same time resented, the tribute he paid Braceway
+through his hesitancy. The man was a clever detective and, if left to
+dominate Greenleaf unopposed, might easily focus attention on a new
+theory of the crime. Not that this could result in the acquittal of the
+negro; but it might deprive him, Bristow, of the credit he was now given.</p>
+
+<p>Wouldn't it be well for him to stay in Furmville another twenty-four
+hours? There was Fulton; he wanted to learn how fully he approved of
+Braceway's refusal to accept the case against Perry Carpenter. Moreover,
+it seemed essential now that he discover the whereabouts of Withers. And
+twenty-four hours could hardly change anything in the kidnapping case.</p>
+
+<p>He tore up what he had written, and rattled off:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Held here twenty-four hours longer by Withers case. Start to New Orleans
+tomorrow morning. Terms accepted."</p></div>
+
+<p>As he handed it to the boy, he saw Mr. Fulton coming up the steps. He
+greeted the old gentleman with easy, smiling cordiality and pushed
+forward a chair for him, giving no sign of impatience at being delayed
+in his trip to the library.</p>
+
+<p>The simple dignity and strength of Fulton's bearing was even more
+impressive than it had been during their first talk. The lines were still
+deep in his face, but his eyes glowed splendidly, and this time, when he
+rested his hands on the chair-arms, they were steady.</p>
+
+<p>"I've come to beg news," he announced, his apologetic smile very winning.</p>
+
+<p>"Just what news?" returned Bristow. "I'll be glad to give you anything I
+can."</p>
+
+<p>"The real results of your trip; that's what I'd like to know about. I got
+no letter or telegram from Sam Braceway this morning; no report at all."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow told him the story in generous detail, concluding with his
+conviction that Morley, although a thorough scoundrel, was innocent of
+any hand in the murder.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish I could agree with you," said the old man. "I wish we all could
+satisfy our minds and take the evidence against the negro as final. But
+we can't. At least, I can't. I can't believe anything but that the
+disguised man, the one with the beard, is the one we've got to find."</p>
+
+<p>"You still think that man is Morley?"</p>
+
+<p>"I do&mdash;which reminds me. I came up here to tell you something I got from
+Maria, my daughter. She told me she had talked with you quite frankly.
+Well, she recalls that once she and this Morley were discussing the
+wearing of beards and moustaches; and he made this remark: 'One thing
+about a beard, it's the best disguise possible.'"</p>
+
+<p>"That is interesting, Mr. Fulton. Anything else?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. He had a good deal to say to that general effect. He said even a
+moustache, cleverly worn, changed a man's whole expression. That struck
+me at once, remembering that the jewels were pawned in Baltimore by a man
+who wore a moustache. Then, too, Morley said something about the value of
+eyebrows in a disguise, substituting bushy ones for thin ones, or vice
+versa. He had the whole business at his tongue's end."</p>
+
+<p>"He said all that, in what connection&mdash;crime?"</p>
+
+<p>"She can't recall that. She merely remembers he said it. I thought you'd
+like to know of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. We can't have too many facts. By the way, sir, can you tell
+me where Mr. Withers is?"</p>
+
+<p>"In Atlanta."</p>
+
+<p>Seeing that he knew nothing of his son-in-law's disappearance, Bristow
+dropped the subject, and asked:</p>
+
+<p>"What is Miss Fulton's belief now? She still thinks Morley is the man?"</p>
+
+<p>The old man hitched his chair closer to Bristow's and lowered his voice.</p>
+
+<p>"She says a curious thing, Mr. Bristow. She declares that, if Morley
+isn't guilty, George Withers is."</p>
+
+<p>"And you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, the talk about George is absurd."</p>
+
+<p>"But," urged Bristow, his smile persuasive, "for the sake of argument, if
+circumstances pointed to him as&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd spend every dollar I have, use the last atom of my strength, to send
+him to the chair! No suffering, no torture, would be too much for him&mdash;if
+that's what you mean to ask me. If I even suspected him, I'd subject him
+to an inquiry more relentless, more searching, more merciless than I'd
+use with anybody else!"</p>
+
+<p>His nostrils expanded curiously. His eyes flamed.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Bristow," he continued, menace in his low tone, "no punishment ever
+devised by man could be sufficient to pay for, to atone for, the horror,
+the enormity, of the destruction of such a woman as my daughter was.
+Mercy? I'd show him no mercy if he lived a thousand years!"</p>
+
+<p>"I understand your feeling," Bristow said. "You're perfectly right, of
+course. And what I was leading up to is this: although we know that the
+idea of Withers' guilt is absurd, he's being made to suffer. You've seen
+intimations, almost direct statements, in the newspapers. People are
+talking disagreeably.</p>
+
+<p>"They're saying that Braceway, employed by you and Withers, is
+persecuting this bank thief in the hope of building up the murder charge,
+so that, if the case against Carpenter falls down, Morley will be the
+logical man to be put on trial. You see?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," Fulton said; "I don't. What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"That you, Withers, and Braceway are afraid Withers may be accused of the
+murder."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! They're saying that, are they? And you were going to say&mdash;what?"</p>
+
+<p>"Simply this: the negro's the guilty man. The facts speak for themselves,
+and facts are incontrovertible. As surely as the sun shines, Carpenter
+killed your daughter. Why, then, continue this gossip, slander which
+besmirches Withers and is bound to attack your daughter's name?"</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean? Be a little more specific, please."</p>
+
+<p>"I mean: what do you and Withers gain by letting Braceway keep this thing
+before the public?"</p>
+
+<p>Fulton leaned far forward in his chair, his lower lip thrust out, his
+eyes blazing.</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir!" he exploded. "I'll never call Braceway off! They're gossiping,
+are they? They can gossip until they're blue in the face. What do I
+care for public opinion, for gossip, for their leers and whispers?
+Nothing&mdash;not a snap of the finger! To hell with what they say! What
+I want is vengeance. I'll have it! Call Braceway off? Not while there's
+breath in me!"</p>
+
+<p>He paused and bit on his lip.</p>
+
+<p>"Understand me, Mr. Bristow," he continued, his tone more moderate. "I
+meant no criticism of you; I know how faithfully you've worked. I realize
+even that you have proved your case. But I can't accept it, that's all.
+You'll forgive an old man's temper."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow carried the argument no further. He saw that Fulton, and Withers
+too, would follow Braceway's lead. Consequently, he was confronted with
+the necessity of keeping up the idiotic duel with the Atlanta detective.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, he sensed the viewpoint of the dead woman's family. They were
+averse to believing she had been the victim of an ordinary negro burglar.
+Remembering her beauty and charm, her cleverness and lovable qualities,
+they preferred to think that some one under great emotion, or with a
+terrific gift for crime, had cut short her brilliant existence.</p>
+
+<p>People, he meditated, find foolish and bizarre means of comforting
+themselves when overwhelmed by great tragedy. Very well, then; let it go
+at that. After all, it was not his funeral.</p>
+
+<p>Accompanying Fulton to the sidewalk, he climbed into the automobile and,
+in a few minutes, was in the library asking for the first volume of the
+last edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His limp proclaimed his
+identity, and the young woman at the desk, recognizing him, got the book
+for him with surprising promptness.</p>
+
+<p>His habits of thought were such that he had not wasted energy during
+the morning in idle speculation as to what he would find. In fact, he
+attached but little importance to Braceway's message. He had dismissed it
+the night before as a queer dodge on the other's part to bolster up his
+view of the case.</p>
+
+<p>He went to a desk in a remote part of the reading room. Under any
+circumstances, he would not have cared for the intense and interested
+scrutiny with which the girl at the desk favoured him. The attitude he
+took gave her ample opportunity for a study of the back of his head.</p>
+
+<p>Opening the volume, he turned to the first reference, page 506, column 2,
+line 15 to line 17. At the first word he drew a quick breath; it was
+sharp enough to sound like a low whistle. He read:</p>
+
+<p>"ALBINO, a biological term (Lat. <i>albus</i>, white), in the usual
+acceptation, for a pigmentless individual of a normally pigmented race."</p>
+
+<p>Putting his finger on the top of the second column, page 507, he counted
+down to line 17, and read:</p>
+
+<p>"Albinism occurs in all races of mankind, among mountainous as well as
+lowland dwellers. And, with man, as with other animals, it may be
+complete or partial. Instances of the latter condition are very common
+among the negroes of the United States and of South America, and in them
+assumes a piebald character, irregular white patches being scattered over
+the general black surface of the body."</p>
+
+<p>Before he began to think, he read the passages carefully a second time.
+Then he continued to hold the book open, staring at it as if he still
+read.</p>
+
+<p>The importance of the words struck him immediately. He grasped their
+meaning as quickly and as fully as he would have done if Braceway had
+stood beside him and explained. The skin of a white person and that of an
+albino show up the same under a microscope: white. If a man had under his
+finger nails particles of white skin, he could have collected them there
+by scratching an albino as well as by scratching a Caucasian, a white
+woman.</p>
+
+<p>And Lucy Thomas was an albino. He was certain of that; did not question
+it for a moment. Braceway had assured himself of that before sending
+the telegram.</p>
+
+<p>Perry Carpenter had had a fight or a tussle with her in securing the key
+to No. 5 the night of the murder, and in the scoffling he had scratched
+her. That, at least, would be Perry's story and Lucy's. Braceway had been
+certain of that also before wiring to him.</p>
+
+<p>As a matter of fact, Braceway had known all this before they had started
+for Washington and had kept it back, playing with him, laughing up his
+sleeve. The thought nettled him, finally made him thoroughly angry. He
+compelled himself to weigh the new situation carefully.</p>
+
+<p>Well, what of it, even if Lucy were an albino and Perry had scratched
+her? Did that affect materially the case against Perry? There was still
+evidence to prove that he had been to the Withers' bungalow. He had
+confessed it himself. And the lavalliere incidents and the blouse buttons
+substantiated it still further.</p>
+
+<p>The albino argument was by no means final, could not be made definite.
+The fact remained that there had been scratches on the murdered woman's
+hand and that particles of a white person's skin had been found under
+Perry's finger nails. That was not to be denied. Of course, the negro's
+attorney could argue that these particles had come from Lucy Thomas, not
+from Mrs. Withers.</p>
+
+<p>But it would be only an argument. The jury would pass judgment on it&mdash;and
+he was willing to leave it to the jury.</p>
+
+<p>He closed the book, took it back to the desk and thanked the young woman.
+There was nothing in his appearance to indicate disappointment. In fact,
+he felt none. By the time he reached home he had gone over the whole
+thing once more and dismissed it as of no real consequence. Braceway's
+discovery, or his making the discovery known, had come too late.</p>
+
+<p>If it had been brought out ahead of Perry's confession&mdash;yes; it would
+have made quite a difference then.</p>
+
+<p>"Let the heathen rage!" he thought, remembering the bitter stubbornness
+with which Braceway and Fulton denied the negro's guilt.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway's withholding the albino information, playing him for a fool,
+recurred to him, and the accustomed flush on his cheeks grew deeper. He
+would not forget that; he would pay it back&mdash;with interest.</p>
+
+<p>He turned to the Loutois case. Going to his typewriter, he made a list of
+New Orleans, Atlanta, and New York newspapers.</p>
+
+<p>"Mattie," he called, "<i>I</i> want you to go down to a news-stand, the big
+one; I think it's at the corner of Haywood and Patton."</p>
+
+<p>He handed her money.</p>
+
+<p>"And here's a list of the papers you're to get. Ask for all of them
+published since last Friday. Be as quick as you can. I'm in a hurry."</p>
+
+<p>When she came back, she brought also the early edition of the Furmville
+afternoon paper. He glanced at it, looking for Washington or Baltimore
+news of Braceway's activities. He found it on the front page. The
+headlines read:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">FINDS NEW EVIDENCE<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ON WITHERS MURDER<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">MORLEY GUILTY, OR&mdash;WHO?<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Whereabouts of Murdered Woman's Husband<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Not Known&mdash;Braceway Predicts New<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">and Amazing Disclosure.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The dispatch itself was:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Washington, D. C., May 14.&mdash;That an entirely new light will soon be
+thrown on the brutal murder of Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers, beauty and
+society favourite of Atlanta and Washington, became known here today.</p>
+
+<p>"Samuel S. Braceway, probably the ablest private detective in this
+country, left this city yesterday afternoon for Furmville, N. C., the
+scene of the crime, after he had completed an exhaustive investigation
+here and in Baltimore of more or less obscure matters related to the
+murder. Police officials here state that the negro, Perry Carpenter,
+now held in the Furmville jail for the crime, will never go to trial.</p>
+
+<p>"This, they claim, will be but one result of the work Braceway did here
+and in Baltimore. The detective himself was reticent when interviewed
+just before he caught his train, but, as he stood on the platform,
+nobbily dressed and twirling his walking stick, he was the picture of
+confidence.</p>
+
+<p>"'I think you're safe in saying,' he admitted 'that the Withers case
+hasn't yet been settled. We're due for some surprising disclosures unless
+I miss my guess.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Can you tell us anything about the suspicions directed against Henry
+Morley?' he was asked.</p>
+
+<p>"'It's Morley or&mdash;somebody else,' Braceway said smilingly. 'Anybody can
+study the facts and satisfy himself on that point.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Who's the somebody else?'</p>
+
+<p>"'We'll know pretty soon. In fact, things should develop in less than a
+week, considerably less than a week.'</p>
+
+<p>"One of the interesting sidelights on this mysterious murder case, it was
+learned this morning, is that the whereabouts of the murdered woman's
+husband, George S. Withers of Atlanta, is at present unknown. Dispatches
+from Atlanta say he disappeared from there the morning his wife's funeral
+took place. Advices from Furmville are that he is not there with his
+father-in-law and sister-in-law. Braceway said yesterday he knew nothing
+of Withers' whereabouts."</p></div>
+
+<p>Beneath the Washington dispatch was one from Atlanta:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Inquiry made here today failed to disclose where George S. Withers,
+husband of the victim of the brutal crime at Furmville, N. C., is now.
+He left this city the morning Mrs. Withers was buried, according to his
+friends, but said nothing as to his destination or the probable length of
+time he would be away.</p>
+
+<p>"The Atlanta authorities were asked by the Washington police to locate
+him if possible. No reason for the request was given."</p></div>
+
+<p>There was a smile on Bristow's lips when he tossed the paper to one side.
+Braceway, he deduced from the article, was having his troubles making the
+Morley theory hang together. And why should he hurry back to Furmville?
+There was nothing new here.</p>
+
+<p>He shrugged his shoulders and unwrapped the bundle of out-of-town papers.</p>
+
+<p>Recalling how late he had received the albino message the night before,
+he concluded that Braceway had filed it in Washington during the
+afternoon, with instructions that it be sent as a night message. His
+resentment for Braceway flared up again.</p>
+
+<p>"'Amazing disclosure,'" he mentally quoted the headlines. "Well, we shall
+see what we shall see. Perhaps, it will come as an amazing disclosure to
+him that I've been on the sound side of this question all along."</p>
+
+<p>He began the work of cutting from the papers the accounts of the Loutois
+kidnapping. As he read them, he built up a tentative outline showing
+who the kidnappers were and where they probably had secreted the boy. He
+grew absorbed, whistling in a low key.</p>
+
+<p>So far as he was concerned, the Withers case was a closed incident.</p>
+
+<p>Early in the afternoon he called Greenleaf on the telephone, and
+announced:</p>
+
+<p>"I'm leaving town for a few days tomorrow morning."</p>
+
+<p>"Again! What for?" the chief asked.</p>
+
+<p>"They've asked me to work out that kidnapping case in New Orleans&mdash;the
+Loutois child."</p>
+
+<p>"Good! I'm glad to hear it; I congratulate you."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf was sincerely pleased. He felt that he had sponsored and
+developed the lame man as a detective.</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks. Before I go, I want to have a talk with you. We might as well go
+over everything once more and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"That reminds me. I was just about to call you up, but your news made me
+forget. I've a wire from Braceway, just got it. He filed it at Salisbury,
+on his way here. Let me read it to you:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"'Have all the stuff I can get on Withers case. Can not go further before
+conferring with you, Bristow, Fulton, and Abrahamson. Please arrange
+meeting of all these Bristow's bungalow eight tonight. Withers not with
+me.'"</p></div>
+
+<p>"That fits in," Bristow commented; "lets me start for New Orleans on the
+late night train."</p>
+
+<p>"Wonder what he's got," the chief questioned. "Do you know?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. And I don't believe it amounts to anything. Still, if he wants to
+talk, we might as well hear it."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure! You can count on me. I'll be there."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Bristow. "I'll see you at eight, then."</p>
+
+<p>He went to the sleeping porch and lay down.</p>
+
+<p>"'Withers not with me,'" the last words of the telegram lingered in his
+mind. "Why did he add that? What's that to do with a conference here
+tonight?"</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly the answer occurred to him.</p>
+
+<p>"It's Withers!" he thought, at first only half-credulous. "He's going to
+put it on Withers; he's going to try to put it on Withers."</p>
+
+<p>He paused, thinking "wild" for a moment, so great was his surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"It was Withers he was after from the start,&mdash;was it?"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXVII"></a>CHAPTER XXVII</h2>
+
+<h3>THE REVELATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Braceway and Maria Fulton had upon their faces that expression which
+announces a happy understanding between lovers. The light of surrender
+was in her eyes, contented surrender to the man who, because of his love,
+had asserted his mastery of her. And his voice, as he spoke to her, was
+all a vibrant tenderness. He realized that he had found and finally made
+certain his happiness, had done so at the very moment of making public
+his greatest professional triumph.</p>
+
+<p>For his visit to her he had stolen a half-hour from the rush of work that
+had devolved upon him since reaching Furmville a few hours ago. He found
+her as he had expected; she fulfilled his prophecy that, in following her
+own ideals, she would take her place in the world as a fascinating
+personality, a lovable woman.</p>
+
+<p>But, while he studied and praised her new charm, he was conscious, more
+keenly so than ever before, that his success would affect her greatly,
+would challenge all her strength and courage. And yet, even if it hurt
+her, it had to be done. It was his duty, and the consequences would have
+to take care of themselves.</p>
+
+<p>Although, in her turn, she regarded him with the fine intuition of the
+woman who loves, she got no intimation of his worry. He had determined
+not to burden her with the details in advance. If what he was about to do
+should link her dead sister with a pitiless scandal, she would meet it
+bravely.</p>
+
+<p>Unless he had been confident of that, he could not have loved her. His
+task was to hand over to justice the guilty man, and not even his concern
+for the woman he would marry could interfere with his seeing the thing
+through.</p>
+
+<p>After it was all over, he would come back to comfort her. Their new
+happiness would counter-balance all. So he thought, with confidence.</p>
+
+<p>A glance through the window showed him Greenleaf and Abrahamson coming
+slowly up Manniston Road. It was eight o'clock. A few moments later he
+and Mr. Fulton joined them on the sidewalk. They went at once to No. 9.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow received them in his living room, the table still littered with
+newspaper clippings on the Loutois kidnapping.</p>
+
+<p>"If the rest of you don't mind," Braceway suggested, "we'd better close
+the windows. We've a lot of talking to do, and we might as well keep
+things to ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>The effect of alertness which he always produced was more evident now
+than ever. He kept his cane and himself in continual motion. While the
+four other men seated themselves, he remained standing, facing them, his
+back to the empty fire-place.</p>
+
+<p>"Each of you," he said, "is vitally interested in what I've come here to
+say. I asked you to have this conference because it affects each of us
+directly."</p>
+
+<p>His eyes shone, his chin was thrust forward, every ligament in his body
+was strung taut. And yet, there was nothing of the theatric about him.
+If he felt excitement, it was suppressed. Determination was the only
+emotion of which he gave any sign.</p>
+
+<p>"First, however," he supplemented in his light, conversational tone, "how
+about you?" He indicated with a look Greenleaf and Bristow. "Have you
+anything new, anything additional?"</p>
+
+<p>With the windows shut, it was noticeably warm and close in the room.
+Taking off his coat, he tossed it to the chair which had been placed for
+him. In his white shirt, with dark trousers belted tightly over slender
+hips, he looked almost boyish.</p>
+
+<p>"No," Bristow answered. "The chief and I went over everything yesterday.
+We couldn't find a single reason for changing our minds."</p>
+
+<p>"About Carpenter?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean that's your position, yours and the chiefs," Braceway said
+seriously. "As a matter of fact, the negro's not guilty."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean that's your position," Bristow quoted back to him, his smile
+indulgent.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Carpenter's not guilty, and Morley's not guilty."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Fulton, who had the chair immediately on the lame man's left, was
+frankly curious and anxious.</p>
+
+<p>"Before you go any further, Braceway," he interrupted testily, "can you
+tell us where George Withers is?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can say this much," replied Braceway after a pause: "for reasons best
+known to himself, Withers refused to join us here. He could have done so
+if he had wished."</p>
+
+<p>What he said sounded like a direct accusation of Withers. Fulton eyed him
+incredulously. Bristow took off his coat and settled himself more
+comfortably in his chair; he was in for a long story, he thought, and, as
+he had expected last night, the dead woman's husband, not Morley, was to
+be incriminated.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, lolling back in a rocker near the folding doors of the dining
+room, gazed at the ceiling, making a show of lack of interest.</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson, nearest the porch door, was the only auditor thoroughly
+absorbed in the detective's story and at the same time unreservedly
+credulous.</p>
+
+<p>"But you know where he is?" Fulton persisted.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; approximately."</p>
+
+<p>The Jew's sparkling eyes darted from the speaker to the faces of the
+others. A pleased smile lifted the corners of his mouth toward the great,
+hooked nose. He anticipated unusually pleasant entertainment.</p>
+
+<p>"But I don't want to waste your time," Braceway continued, taking
+peculiar care in his choice of words. "When I began work on this case,
+I thought either the negro or Morley might be the murderer. I changed
+my mind when I came to think about the mysterious fellow, the man with
+the brown beard and the gold tooth, the individual who was clever enough
+to appear and disappear at will, to vanish without leaving a trace so
+long as he operated at night or in the dusk of early evening.</p>
+
+<p>"I agreed with Mr. Fulton that he was the murderer. Not only that, but he
+had remarkable ability which he employed for the lowest and most criminal
+purposes. I first suspected his identity right after my interviews last
+Wednesday with Roddy, the coloured bellboy, and Mr. Abrahamson, the pawn
+broker."</p>
+
+<p>"Excuse me," Bristow interposed; "but wasn't it Abrahamson who told you
+the bearded man looked like Withers?"</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf grinned, appreciating the lame man's intention to take the wind
+out of Braceway's sails by giving credit to Abrahamson for the
+information.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, he told me that," Braceway answered, as if nettled by the
+interruption; and added: "Let me finish my statement, Bristow. You can
+discuss it all you please later on. But I'd prefer to get through with it
+now.</p>
+
+<p>"Having suspected the identity of the disguised man, I was confronted
+with two jobs. One was to prove the identity beyond question; the other
+was to show, by irrefutable evidence, that the disguised man committed
+the murder. As I said, my theory took shape in my mind that afternoon in
+my room in the Brevord Hotel. Everything I've done since then, has been
+for the purpose of getting the necessary facts.</p>
+
+<p>"I have those facts now."</p>
+
+<p>He looked at Greenleaf and Bristow, making it plain that he expected
+their hostility to anything he had to say.</p>
+
+<p>"My suspicion grew out of my belief that I must find the man who had
+blackmailed Mrs. Withers in Atlantic City and Washington, and, for the
+third time, here in Furmville. The blackmailer was the only one who had
+had access to the victim on the three different occasions of which we
+know; the work was all by the same hand. Find the blackmailer, and I had
+the murderer.</p>
+
+<p>"I know now who he is.</p>
+
+<p>"Five years ago there was a striking sort of individuality that had
+impressed itself on the minds of a good many men in Wall Street, New York
+City. Although penniless at the outset of his career, and in fact never
+really rich, he had made a good deal of money now and then; and had spent
+it as fast as he got it.</p>
+
+<p>"He was brilliant, thoroughly unscrupulous, absolutely without honour. He
+did the 'Great White Way' stunt&mdash;the restaurants, the roof gardens, a
+pretty actress at times, jewels and champagne. Because of his uncertain
+habits, he never had an office of his own. He always operated through
+others. His earning power was a gift of judging the market and knowing
+when to 'bear' and when to 'bull.'</p>
+
+<p>"This gift was no fabulous thing. It was real in a majority of the times
+he tried to use it, and because of it he was able to live high and put up
+a good front. This was the situation up to five years ago. Observe the
+man's character and the pleasure he took in running crooked.</p>
+
+<p>"With a little study and the usual amount of industry and concentration,
+he could have been a power in the financial world. That, however, did
+not appeal to him. He liked the excitement of crime, the perverted
+pleasure of playing the crook.</p>
+
+<p>"Early in nineteen-thirteen, a little more than five years ago, the crash
+came. He was arrested, charged with the embezzlement of thirty-three
+hundred dollars from the firm which employed him. The name of the firm
+was Blanchard and Sebastian. He had stolen more than the amount
+mentioned, but the specific charge on which action was taken was the
+theft of the thirty-three hundred.</p>
+
+<p>"This man's name was Splain.</p>
+
+<p>"There was a delay of a few hours in arranging for his bail so that he
+wouldn't have to spend the night in prison. While in his cell, he
+remarked:</p>
+
+<p>"'This kind of a place doesn't suit me. It's as cold as charity. I'll be
+out of here in an hour or so, and, if they ever get me into a cell again,
+they'll have to kill me first. Once is enough.'</p>
+
+<p>"He made good his boast. They didn't get him into one again. He jumped
+his bail ten days before the date set for his trial. Since then the
+police have, so far as they know, never laid eyes on him. They had a
+photograph of him, of course, an adequate description: high aquiline
+nose; firm, compressed mouth; black and unusually piercing eyes; black
+hair; all his features sharp-cut; broad shoulders, and slender, athletic
+figure. Those are some of the details I recall. In&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Fulton cried out. It was like the shrill, indefinite protest of a child
+against pain. He put the fingers of his right hand to his forehead,
+shielding his face. The description of the fugitive had brought instantly
+to his mind the face of George Withers.</p>
+
+<p>"Indulge me for just a few moments more, Mr. Fulton," Braceway said.
+"Splain eluded the pursuit. His flight and disappearance were perfectly
+planned and carried out, and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Bristow again interrupted the recital. On his face was a smile which did
+not reach to his eyes. For the past few minutes he had been thinking
+faster than he had ever thought in his life, and had made a decision.</p>
+
+<p>"What you've told us," he said calmly, his gaze taking knowledge of no
+one but the detective, "is, in effect, a rather flattering sketch of a
+part of my own life."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, with jaw dropped and thinking powers paralyzed, stared at him.
+Fulton leaned forward as if to spring.</p>
+
+<p>Only Abrahamson, his smile broadening, his cavernous eyes alight, was
+free from surprise. He had now the air of greatly enjoying the
+performance he had been invited to see.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway, his shoulders flung back, his figure straight as a poplar,
+watching Bristow with intense caution, grew suddenly into heroic mould.
+The red glow from the setting sun streamed through the window to his
+face, emphasizing the ardour in his eyes. He took a step forward, became
+dominant, menacing.</p>
+
+<p>His white-clad arm shot out so that he pointed with accusing finger to
+the imperturbable Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"That man there," he declared, a crawling contempt in his voice, "is the
+thief and the murderer!"</p>
+
+<p>For a heavy moment the incredible accusation stunned the entire group.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Braceway," said Bristow, looking now at Fulton and Greenleaf, "is
+suffering a delusion."</p>
+
+<p>The two men, however, afforded him no support. They kept their eyes on
+Braceway. They gave the effect of falling away from some evil contagion.</p>
+
+<p>"Because," Bristow continued, "I have been the innocent victim of trumped
+up charges of embezzlement by the crookedest man in a crooked business,
+he accuses me of murder when&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Shut up!" commanded Braceway, dropping his hand to his side.</p>
+
+<p>He flashed the pawn broker a quick glance.</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson leaned over and rapped with his knuckles on the door to the
+porch. It opened, admitting two policemen in uniform.</p>
+
+<p>"I took the liberty, chief," Braceway apologized, "of requesting them to
+be here. I knew you'd want them to do the right thing, and promptly."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf gulped, nodded acquiescence. Stunned as he was, the detective's
+manner forced him into believing the charge.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow's smile had faded. But, save for a pallor that wiped from his
+checks their usual flush, there was no evidence of the conflict within
+him. So far as any notice from him went, the policemen did not exist.</p>
+
+<p>One of them stepped forward and laid a hand on his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>He ignored it</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps," he said, sarcasm in his voice, his eyes again on Braceway,
+"it will occur to you that I've a right to know why this outrage is
+committed."</p>
+
+<p>Once more he commanded Greenleaf with his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"The chief of police will hardly sanction it without some excuse, without
+a shadow of evidence."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Greenleaf complied waveringly. "Er&mdash;, that is&mdash;er&mdash;I suppose
+you're certain about this, Mr. Braceway?"</p>
+
+<p>"Let's have it! Let's have it all!" demanded Fulton, articulate at last,
+his clenched hands shaken by the palsy of rage.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, with a careless motion, brushed away the policeman's hand.</p>
+
+<p>"By all means," he said, imperturbable still; "I demand it. I'm not
+guilty of murder. Not by the wildest flight of the craziest fancy can any
+such charge be substantiated."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, noting his iron nerve, his freedom from the slightest sign of
+panic, was dumbfounded, and believed in his innocence again.</p>
+
+<p>"I have the proofs," Braceway said to the chief. "Do you want them here,
+and now?"</p>
+
+<p>"It might be&mdash;er&mdash;as well, and&mdash;and fair, you know. Yes."</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson swung the porch door shut. The two policemen stood back of
+Bristow's chair. Greenleaf, still bewildered, laid a calming hand on
+Fulton's shoulder. The old man was shaking like a leaf.</p>
+
+<p>"All right," agreed Braceway. "I can give you the important points in a
+very few minutes; the high lights."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXVIII"></a>CHAPTER XXVIII</h2>
+
+<h3>CONFESSION VOLUNTARY</h3>
+
+
+<p>Braceway leaned against the mantel, relaxed, swinging his cane slowly in
+his right hand, a careless, easy grace in his attitude. He addressed
+himself to Fulton and Greenleaf, an occasional glance including
+Abrahamson in the circle of those for whose benefit he spoke.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow listened now in unfeigned absorption, estimating every statement,
+weighing each detail. The tenseness of his pale face showed how he forced
+his brain to concentration.</p>
+
+<p>"Having decided that the bearded man and the murderer were the same,"
+Braceway began, "I asked myself this question: 'Who, of all those in
+Furmville, is so connected with the case now that I am warranted in
+thinking he did the previous blackmailing and this murder?' And I
+eliminated in my own mind everybody but Lawrence Bristow. He was the one,
+the only one, who could have annoyed Mrs. Withers one and four years ago,
+respectively, and also could have murdered her.</p>
+
+<p>"Morley was at once out of the reckoning; he had known the Fultons for
+only the past three years. To consider the negro, Perry Carpenter, would
+have been absurd. Withers, of course, was beyond suspicion. Everything
+pointed to Bristow.</p>
+
+<p>"With that decision last Wednesday afternoon, I went to Number Five and
+got all the finger-prints visible on the polished surfaces of the chair
+which was handled, overturned, in the living room the night of the
+murder. Fortunately, this polish was inferior enough to have been made
+gummy by the rain and dampness that night; and, in the stress of the few
+days following, had been neither dusted nor wiped off.</p>
+
+<p>"Bristow did not touch this chair the morning the murder was discovered.
+In fact, he cautioned everybody not to touch it.</p>
+
+<p>"Reliable witnesses say he didn't touch it between then and the time I
+got the finger-prints. He declares he was never in the bungalow before he
+entered it in response to Miss Fulton's cry for help.</p>
+
+<p>"I found on the chair the finger-prints of five different persons, four
+afterwards identified: Miss Fulton, the coroner, Miss Kelly and Lucy
+Thomas. The fifth I was unable to check up then.</p>
+
+<p>"I did so later, in Washington.</p>
+
+<p>"It was identical with the print of Bristow's fingers on the glass top of
+a table in his hotel room there. I didn't depend on my own judgment for
+that. I had with me an expert on finger-prints. And finger-prints, as you
+all know, never lie.</p>
+
+<p>"All this established the fact, beyond question, that Bristow had been
+secretly in the living room of Number Five before, or at the time of, the
+commission of the crime."</p>
+
+<p>He paused, giving them time to appreciate the full import of that chain
+of facts.</p>
+
+<p>For the space of half a minute, the room was a study in still life. The
+sound of Fulton's grating teeth was distinctly audible. Bristow made a
+quick move, as if to speak, but checked the impulse.</p>
+
+<p>"In Washington," Braceway resumed, "he had the hemorrhage. It was
+faked&mdash;a red-ink hemorrhage. Before the arrival of the physician who was
+summoned, Bristow had ordered a bellboy to wrap the 'blood-stained'
+handkerchief and towel in a larger and thicker towel and to have the
+whole bundle burned at once.</p>
+
+<p>"This, he explained to the boy, was because of his desire that nobody be
+put in danger of contracting tuberculosis.</p>
+
+<p>"By bribing the porter who had been directed to do the burning, I got a
+look at both the handkerchief and the towel. They were soaked right
+enough, thoroughly soaked&mdash;in the red ink.</p>
+
+<p>"The physician was easily deceived because, when he came in, all traces
+of the so-called blood had been obliterated. Altogether, it was a clever
+trick on Bristow's part.</p>
+
+<p>"His motive for staging it and for arranging for a long and uninterrupted
+sleep was clear enough. There was something he wanted to do unobserved,
+something so vital to him that he was willing to take an immense amount
+of trouble with it. Golson's detective bureau let me have the best
+trailer, the smoothest 'shadow,' in the business&mdash;Tom Ricketts.</p>
+
+<p>"At my direction he followed Bristow from the Willard Hotel to the
+electric car leaving Washington for Baltimore at one o'clock. Reaching
+Baltimore at two-thirty, Bristow pawned the emeralds and diamonds at two
+pawnshops. He caught the four o'clock electric car back to Washington,
+and was in his room long before six, the hour at which his nurse, Miss
+Martin, was to wake him.</p>
+
+<p>"On the Baltimore trip he had a left leg as sound as mine and wore no
+brace of any kind. He did wear a moustache, and bushy eyebrows, which
+changed his appearance tremendously. Also, he had changed the outline of
+his face and the shape of his lips.</p>
+
+<p>"While he was in Baltimore, I searched the bedroom in which he was
+supposed to be asleep.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Martin, in whom I had been obliged to confide, helped me. We found
+in the two-inch sole of the left shoe, which of course he did not take
+with him, a hollow place, a very serviceable receptacle. In it was the
+bulk of the missing Withers jewelry, the stones unset, pried from their
+gold and platinum settings.</p>
+
+<p>"They are, I dare say, there now."</p>
+
+<p>The two policemen stared wide-eyed at Bristow. He was, they decided, the
+"slickest" man they had ever seen.</p>
+
+<p>"You see why he executed the trick? It was to establish forever, beyond
+the possibility of question, his innocence. Plainly, if an unknown man
+pawned the Withers jewelry in Baltimore while Bristow slept, exhausted by
+a major hemorrhage, in Washington, his case was made good, his alibi
+perfect.</p>
+
+<p>"You can appreciate now how he built up his fake case against Perry
+Carpenter, his use of the buttons, his creeping about at night, like a
+villain in cheap melodrama, dropping pieces of the jewelry where they
+would incriminate the negro most surely, and his exploitation of the
+'winning clue,' the finger nail evidence.</p>
+
+<p>"Furthermore, he gave Lucy Thomas a frightful beating to force from her
+the statement against Perry. In this, he was brutal beyond belief. I saw
+that same afternoon the marks of his blows on her shoulders. They were
+sufficient proofs of his capacity for unbridled rage. The sight of them
+strengthened my conviction that, in a similar mood, he had murdered Mrs.
+Withers."</p>
+
+<p>"The negro lied!" Bristow broke in at last, his words a little fast
+despite his surface equanimity. "I subjected her to no ill treatment
+whatever. Anyway"&mdash;he dismissed it with a wave of his hand&mdash;"it's a minor
+detail."</p>
+
+<p>Braceway, without so much as a glance at him, continued:</p>
+
+<p>"And that gave me my knowledge of her being a partial albino. She has
+patches of white skin across her shoulders, and Perry, in struggling with
+her for possession of the key to Number Five, had scratched her there
+badly. That, I think, disposes of the finger nail evidence against
+Carpenter.</p>
+
+<p>"The rest followed as a matter of course. An examination of Major Ross'
+collection of circulars describing those 'wanted' by the police of the
+various cities for the past six years revealed the photograph of Splain.
+Bristow has changed his appearance somewhat&mdash;enough, perhaps, to deceive
+the casual glance&mdash;but the identification was easy.</p>
+
+<p>"I then ran over to New York and got the Splain story. I knew he was so
+dead sure of having eluded everybody that he would stay here in
+Furmville. But, to make it absolutely sure, I sent him yesterday a
+telegram to keep him assured that I was working with him and ready to
+share discoveries with him. And I confess it afforded me a little
+pleasure, the sending of that wire. I was playing a kind of cat-and-mouse
+game."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow put up his hand, demanding attention. When Braceway ignored the
+gesture, he leaned back, smiling, derisive.</p>
+
+<p>"Morley's embezzlement and its consequences gave me a happy excuse for
+keeping on this fellow's trail while he was busy perfecting the machinery
+for Perry's destruction. The man's self-assurance, his conceit&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I've had enough of this!" Bristow cut in violently, exhibiting his first
+deep emotion. He turned to Greenleaf:</p>
+
+<p>"Haven't you had enough of this drool? What's the man trying to establish
+anyhow? He talks in one breath about my having changed the outline of my
+face and the shape of my mouth, and in the next second about recognizing
+as me a photograph which he admits was taken at least six years ago!</p>
+
+<p>"It's an alibi for himself, an excuse for not being able to prove that
+I'm the man who pawned the jewelry in Baltimore! It's thinner than air!"</p>
+
+<p>But Greenleaf's defection was now complete.</p>
+
+<p>"Go on," he said to Braceway. The more he thought of the full extent to
+which the embezzler had gulled him for the past week, the more he raged.</p>
+
+<p>"Not for me! I don't want any more of the drivel!" Bristow objected
+again, his voice raucous and still directed to Greenleaf. "What's <i>your</i>
+idea? I admit I'm wanted in New York on a trumped-up charge of
+embezzlement. This detective, by a stroke of blind luck, ran into that;
+and, as I say, I admit it.</p>
+
+<p>"You can deal with that as you see fit; that is, if you want to deal with
+it after what I've done for law and order, and for you, in this murder
+case.</p>
+
+<p>"But you can't be crazy enough to take any stock in this nonsense about
+my having been connected with the crime. Exercise your own intelligence!
+Great God, man! Do you mean to say you're going to let him cram this into
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>He got himself more in hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Think a minute. You know me well, chief. And you, Mr. Fulton, you're no
+child to be bamboozled and turned into a laughing stock by a detective
+who finds himself without a case&mdash;a pseudo expert on crime who tries to
+work the age-old trick of railroading a man guilty of a less offense!"</p>
+
+<p>"This is no place for an argument of the case," Braceway said crisply.
+"Mr. Abrahamson, tell us what you know about this man."</p>
+
+<p>"It is not much, Mr. Braceway," the Jew replied; "not as much as I would
+like. I've seen him several times; once in my place when he was fixed up
+with moustache and so forth, and twice when he was fixed up with a beard
+and a gold tooth; once again when he was sitting out here on his porch."</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson talked rapidly, punctuating his phrases with quick gestures,
+enjoying the importance of his role.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Braceway," he explained smilingly to Greenleaf, "talked to me about
+the man with the beard&mdash;talked more than you did, chief. You know Mr.
+Braceway&mdash;how quick he is. He talked and asked me to try to remember
+where and when I had seen this Mr. Bristow. I had my ideas and my
+association of ideas. I remembered&mdash;remembered hard. That afternoon I
+took a holiday&mdash;I don't take many of those&mdash;and I walked past here.
+'I bet you,' I said to myself&mdash;not out real loud, you understand&mdash;'I bet
+you I know that man.' And I won my bet. I did know him.</p>
+
+<p>"This Mr. Splain and the man with the beard are the same, exactly the
+same."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow's smile was tolerant, as if he dealt with a child. But Fulton,
+his angry eyes boring into the accused man, saw that, for the first time,
+there were tired lines tugging the corners of his mouth. It was an
+expression that heralded defeat, the first faint shadow of despair.</p>
+
+<p>"You have my story, and I've the facts to prove it a hundred times over,"
+Braceway announced. "Why waste more time?"</p>
+
+<p>"For the simple reason," Bristow fought on, "that I'm entitled to a fair
+deal, an honest&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>On the word "honest" Braceway turned with his electric quickness to
+Greenleaf, and, as he did so, Bristow leaned back in his chair, as if
+determined not to argue further. His face assumed its hard, bleak calm;
+his cold self-control returned.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, get this!" Braceway's incisive tone whipped Greenleaf to closer
+attention. "You've an embezzler and murderer in your hands. He admits one
+crime; I've proved the other. The rest is up to you. Put the irons on
+him. Throw him into a cell! You'll be proud of it the rest of your life.
+Here's the warrant."</p>
+
+<p>He drew the paper from his hip pocket and tossed it to the chief.</p>
+
+<p>"Get busy," he insisted. "This man's the worst type of criminal I've ever
+encountered. Not content with blackmailing and robbing a woman, he
+murdered her; not satisfied with that, he deliberately planned the death
+of an innocent man because he, in his cowardice, was afraid to take the
+ordinary chances of escaping detection. By openly parading his pursuit of
+breakers of the law, he secured secretly his opportunity to excel their
+basest actions. He&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Quicker than thought, Braceway lunged forward with his cane and struck
+the hand Bristow had lifted swiftly to his throat. The blow sent a pocket
+knife clattering to the floor. A policeman, picking it up, saw that the
+opened blade worked on a spring.</p>
+
+<p>The accused man sank back in his chair. The gray immobility of his face
+had broken up. The features worked curiously, forming themselves for a
+second to a pattern of mean vindictiveness. His right hand still numbed
+by the blow, he took his handkerchief with the left and flicked from his
+neck, close to the ear, a single red bead.</p>
+
+<p>"Search him," Braceway ordered one of the officers.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow submitted to that. When he looked at Braceway, his face was still
+bleak.</p>
+
+<p>"You've got me," he said in a tone thoroughly matter-of-fact. "I'm
+through. I'll give you a statement."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean a confession?"</p>
+
+<p>"It amounts to that."</p>
+
+<p>"Not here," Braceway refused curtly. "We've no stenographer."</p>
+
+<p>"I'd prefer to write it myself anyway," he insisted. "It won't take me
+fifteen minutes on the typewriter." Seeing Braceway hesitate, he added:
+"You'll get it this way, or not at all. Suit yourself."</p>
+
+<p>The detective did not underestimate the man's stubborn nerve.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm agreeable, chief," he said to Greenleaf, "if you are."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," the chief agreed. "It's as good here as anywhere else."</p>
+
+<p>Darkness had grown in the room. Abrahamson and the policeman pulled down
+the window shades. Greenleaf turned on the lights.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow limped to the typewriter and sat down. Braceway opened the drawer
+of the typewriter stand and saw that it contained nothing but sheets of
+yellow "copy" paper cut to one-half the size of ordinary letter paper.</p>
+
+<p>Every trace of agitation had left Bristow. Colour crept back into his
+cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>Braceway and Greenleaf watched him closely. They had the idea that he
+still contemplated suicide, that he sought to divert their attention from
+himself by interesting them in what he wrote. They remembered the boast
+he had made in the cell in New York.</p>
+
+<p>He felt their wariness, and smiled.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXIX"></a>CHAPTER XXIX</h2>
+
+<h3>THE LAST CARD</h3>
+
+
+<p>He worked with surprising rapidity, tearing from the machine and passing
+to Braceway each half-page as he finished it. He wrote triple-space,
+breaking the story into many paragraphs, never hesitating for a choice of
+words.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"My name is Thomas F. Splain.</p>
+
+<p>"I am forty years old.</p>
+
+<p>"I am 'wanted' in New York for embezzlement.</p>
+
+<p>"Fear is an unknown quantity to me. I have always had ample
+self-confidence. The world belongs to the impudent.</p>
+
+<p>"I learned long ago that no man is at heart either grateful, or honest,
+or unselfish."</p></div>
+
+<p>With a turn of the roller, he flicked that off the machine and, without
+raising his head, passed it to Braceway. The detective glanced at it long
+enough to get its meaning and handed it to Fulton. When it was offered to
+Greenleaf, he shook his head.</p>
+
+<p>The chiefs rage had reached its high point. To his realization of how
+perfectly he had been duped, there was added the humiliation of having
+two members of his force as witnesses of its revelation.</p>
+
+<p>"If he makes a move," he thought savagely, fingering the revolver in the
+side pocket of his coat, "I'll kill him certain."</p>
+
+<p>The man at the machine wrote on:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"After leaving New York, I was caught in a street accident in Chicago,
+suffering a broken nose. Thanks to my physicians&mdash;an incompetent lot,
+these doctors&mdash;I emerged with a crooked nose.</p>
+
+<p>"That was a help. I then had all my teeth extracted. Knowing dentistry,
+I saw the possibilities of disguise by wearing differently shaped sets
+of teeth.</p>
+
+<p>"Note my heavily protruding lower lip&mdash;and, at rare intervals, my hollow
+cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>"Also, there's your gold-tooth mystery&mdash;solved!</p>
+
+<p>"As a disguise, the gold tooth is admirable. I mean a solid, complete
+tooth of gold, garish in the front part of the mouth.</p>
+
+<p>"It unfailingly changes the expression; frequently, it degrades and
+brutalizes the face. Try it.</p>
+
+<p>"Using my crooked nose as an every-day precaution, I always straightened
+it for night work. Forestier taught me that&mdash;great man, Forestier;
+marvellous with noses.</p>
+
+<p>"He is now piling up a fortune as make-up specialist for motion pictures
+in Los Angeles&mdash;has a secret preparation with which he 'builds' new
+noses.</p>
+
+<p>"Changing the colour of my eyes was something beyond the police
+imagination.</p>
+
+<p>"I got the trick from a man in Cincinnati&mdash;another great character.
+Homatropine is the basic element of his preparation.</p>
+
+<p>"Some day women will hear of it and make him rich. He deserves it."</p></div>
+
+<p>Fulton, after he had read that, looked at Braceway out of tortured eyes.
+This turning of his tragedy into jest defied his strength.</p>
+
+<p>"That's enough of that," Braceway raised his voice above the clatter of
+the typewriter. "Get down to the crime, or stop!"</p>
+
+<p>"By all means," Bristow assented.</p>
+
+<p>Flicking from the roller the page he had already begun, he tore it up and
+inserted another.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I met Enid Fulton six years ago at Hot Springs, Virginia. She fell in
+love with me.</p>
+
+<p>"I had always known that a rich woman's indiscretions could be made to
+yield big dividends. She was a victim of her&mdash;&mdash;"</p></div>
+
+<p>Braceway's grasp caught the writer's hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Eliminate that!" he ordered sternly. "It's not necessary."</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, imperturbable, his motions quick and sure, tore up that page
+also, and started afresh:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Later she believed I had embezzled in order to assure her ease and
+luxury from the date of our marriage.</p>
+
+<p>"Her exaggerated sense of fair play, of obligation, was an aid to my
+representations of the situation.</p>
+
+<p>"Although she no longer loved me and did love Withers, my hold on her,
+rather on her purse, could not be broken.</p>
+
+<p>"She gave me the money in Atlantic City and Washington. I played the
+market, and lost. I no longer had my cunning in dealing with stocks.</p>
+
+<p>"I came here as soon as I had learned of her presence in Furmville. At
+first, she was reasonable. Abrahamson knows that. I pawned several
+little things with him.</p>
+
+<p>"At last she grew obstinate. She argued that, if she pawned any more of
+her jewels, she would be unable to redeem them because her father had
+failed in business.</p>
+
+<p>"But I had to have funds. Several times I pointed this out to her when I
+saw her in Number Five&mdash;always after midnight, for my own protection as
+well as hers.</p>
+
+<p>"Finally, my patience was exhausted. Last Monday night, or early Tuesday
+morning, I told her so, quite clearly.</p>
+
+<p>"She argued, plead with me. All this was in whispers. The necessity of
+whispering so long irritated me.</p>
+
+<p>"Her refusal, flat and final, to part with the jewels enraged me. It was
+then that I made the first big mistake of my life.</p>
+
+<p>"I lost my temper. Men who can not control their tempers under the most
+trying circumstances should let crime alone. They will fail.</p>
+
+<p>"I killed her&mdash;a foolish result of the folly of yielding to my rage.</p>
+
+<p>"Standing there and looking at her, I pondered, with all the clarity I
+could command. In a second, I perceived the advisability of throwing the
+blame upon some other person."</p></div>
+
+<p>The faces of Braceway and Fulton mirrored to the others the horror of the
+stuff they were reading. The scene taxed the emotional balance of all of
+them. The evil-faced man at the typewriter, the father getting by degrees
+the description of his daughter's death, the policemen waiting to put the
+murderer behind bars&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Abrahamson, peculiarly wrought upon by the tenseness of it all, wished he
+had not come. His back felt creepy. He lit a cigarette, puffed it to a
+torch and threw it down.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow wrote on:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Mechanically, my fingers went to a pocket in my vest and played with two
+metal buttons I had picked up in my kitchen the day before, Monday.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew the buttons had come from the overalls of the negro, Perry
+Carpenter. It would be easy to drop one there, the other on the floor of
+my kitchen, where I had originally found them.</p>
+
+<p>"That would be the beginning of identifying him as the murderer. He had
+been half-drunk the day before.</p>
+
+<p>"The rest was simple&mdash;dropping the lavalliere links back of Number Five,
+placing the lavalliere in the yard of his house, and so on.</p>
+
+<p>"I had one piece of luck which, of course, I did not count on when I
+first adopted this simple course. That was when Greenleaf asked me to
+help him in finding the murderer. A confiding soul&mdash;your Greenleaf&mdash;and
+insured by nature against brain storms.</p>
+
+<p>"Such a turn was a godsend. I had become the investigator of my own
+crime.</p>
+
+<p>"There remains to be told only the fact that I made a second trip to
+Number Five.</p>
+
+<p>"Having come back here in safety, I perceived I had left there without
+the jewels she was wearing and without those in her jewel cabinet.</p>
+
+<p>"She had brought this cabinet into the living room to show me how her
+supply of jewelry had been depleted.</p>
+
+<p>"To murder and not get the fruits of it, is like picking one's own
+pocket. I returned immediately and rectified the mistake.</p>
+
+<p>"Before departing this last time, I switched on the lights to assure
+myself that I had left only the clue to the negro's presence, none to my
+own.</p>
+
+<p>"That explains Withers' story of his struggle at the foot of the steps.
+We really had it.</p>
+
+<p>"In the ordinary course of events, the negro would have gone to the
+chair.</p>
+
+<p>"But there were complications I did not foresee.</p>
+
+<p>"Morley's theft and clamour for money from Miss Fulton, Withers'
+jealousy, and my own extra precaution of appearing with beard and gold
+tooth in the Brevord Hotel, so as to shift suspicion to a mysterious
+'unknown' in case of necessity; all these things left too many clues,
+presented an embarrassment of riches.</p>
+
+<p>"If I had known of them in advance, either Morley or Withers would have
+paid the penalty for the crime. The negro would never have received my
+attention.</p>
+
+<p>"I have no game leg, never have had. The brace made it easy for me to
+transform myself into an agile, powerful man in my 'private' work.</p>
+
+<p>"I have no tuberculosis, never have had. I have a normally flat chest.
+Sluggish veins and capillaries in my face, caused by my having suffered
+pathological blushing for ten years, cause a permanent flush in my
+cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>"That was enough to fool the physicians. Besides, when the Galenites have
+once diagnosed your purse favourably, your disease is what you please.</p>
+
+<p>"I have said my first great mistake was losing my temper with Enid
+Withers.</p>
+
+<p>"My second was my laughter in the cab the night Braceway and I questioned
+Morley. I knew he was holding back something, but I never dreamed it was
+his knowledge of my having done the murder.</p>
+
+<p>"That laugh was suicidal, for it was the disarming of myself by myself.</p>
+
+<p>"But for the albino discovery by Braceway, my conviction would have been
+impossible. The case against Perry was too strong.</p>
+
+<p>"Still, it is as well this way as another. I should never have served the
+time for embezzlement. A free life is a fine thing. I suspect that death,
+perhaps, is even finer."</p></div>
+
+<p>He handed the last page to Braceway, leaned back in his chair, put up his
+arms and yawned. The glance with which he swept the faces of those before
+him was arrogant. It had a sinister audacity.</p>
+
+<p>"The confession's complete," Braceway told Greenleaf, clipping his words
+short. "Take him away. No&mdash;wait!" He pulled a pen from his pocket and
+turned to the prisoner.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, the signature," Bristow said coolly. "I forgot that."</p>
+
+<p>He took the typewritten pages roughly from Fulton, and in a bold, free
+hand wrote at the bottom of each: "Thomas F. Splain."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm ready," he announced, rising from his chair so that he jostled
+Fulton unnecessarily.</p>
+
+<p>The old man, his self-control broken at last, struck him with open hand
+full in the face. His fingers left three red stripes across the
+murderer's white cheek.</p>
+
+<p>Before Braceway could interfere, Bristow checked his impulse to strike
+back and gave Fulton a long, level look.</p>
+
+<p>"You're welcome to it," he said finally; "welcome, old man. I guess I
+still owe you something, at that."</p>
+
+<p>"Put the cuffs on him," ordered Greenleaf.</p>
+
+<p>"First, though, I'd like to have a clean collar, some clean linen; and I
+want to get rid of this brace," Bristow interrupted.</p>
+
+<p>"To hell with what you want!" Greenleaf cried, a shade more purple with
+rage.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow turned to Braceway:</p>
+
+<p>"You're right. The stuff's in the sole of this shoe."</p>
+
+<p>"Let's take charge of that now," Braceway said to the chief. They each
+grasped one of the prisoner's arms and hustled him with scant ceremony
+to his bedroom. Bristow removed his trousers and, unbuckling the belt and
+straps of the steel brace, took off the thick-soled shoe.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf put his hand into it and tugged at the inner sole.</p>
+
+<p>"Opens on the outside," prompted Braceway, "underneath, near the instep."</p>
+
+<p>The chief, after fumbling with it a moment, got it open. The jewels
+streamed to the floor, a little cascade of radiance and colour. He picked
+them up, getting down on all-fours so as not to miss one.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be unreasonable," Bristow complained as he slipped on another
+shoe. "Let me have a clean shirt and collar."</p>
+
+<p>"Be quick about it," Braceway consented, his voice heavy with contempt.</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf, holding him again by one arm, shoved him toward the bureau. He
+got out of his shirt, Greenleaf shifting his grasp so as not to let go of
+him for a second. In trying to put the front collar button into the fresh
+shirt, he broke off its head.</p>
+
+<p>"Come on," growled the chief. "You don't need a collar anyway."</p>
+
+<p>"Not so fast! I've more than one collar button."</p>
+
+<p>He put his hand into a tray and picked up another. It had a long shank
+and was easily manipulated because of the catch that permitted the
+movement of its head, as if on a hinge.</p>
+
+<p>"This is better," he said, fingering it, unhurried as a man with hours to
+throw away.</p>
+
+<p>"Get a move on! Get a move!" Greenleaf growled again, tightening his hold
+until it was painful.</p>
+
+<p>Bristow, apparently bent on throwing off this rough grasp on his left
+arm, swiftly raised his right hand with the button to his mouth.</p>
+
+<p>For the fraction of a second his eyes, bright and defiant, met
+Braceway's. The detective, reading the elation in them, shouted:</p>
+
+<p>"Look out!"</p>
+
+<p>There was a click. And Bristow flung away the button as Braceway caught
+at his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"I beat you after&mdash;&mdash;" he tried to boast.</p>
+
+<p>But the poison, quicker than he had thought, cut short his utterance. His
+eyelids flickered twice. He collapsed against Greenleaf and slid,
+crumpled, to the floor.</p>
+
+<p>"Cyanide," said Braceway. "He had it in the shank of that collar button."</p>
+
+<p>Greenleaf bent over him.</p>
+
+<p>"God, it's quick!" he announced. "He's dead."</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
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diff --git a/20152.txt b/20152.txt
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--- /dev/null
+++ b/20152.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,9834 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Winning Clue, by James Hay, Jr.
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Winning Clue
+
+
+Author: James Hay, Jr.
+
+
+
+Release Date: December 20, 2006  [eBook #20152]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WINNING CLUE***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Garcia, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/c/)
+
+
+
+THE WINNING CLUE
+
+by
+
+JAMES HAY, Jr.
+
+Author of The Man Who Forgot, Etc.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Grosset & Dunlap
+Publishers New York
+Copyright, 1919
+By Dodd, Mead and Company, Inc.
+
+
+
+TO GRAHAM B. NICHOL
+AS A LITTLE TOKEN OF MY ADMIRATION AND AFFECTION
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAPTER
+
+      I. Strangled
+
+     II. "Something Big in It"
+
+    III. The Ruby Ring
+
+     IV. Two Trails
+
+      V. The Husband's Story
+
+     VI.  Morley Is in a Hurry
+
+    VII. Miss Fulton Is Hysterical
+
+   VIII. The Breath of Scandal
+
+     IX. Women's Nerves
+
+      X. Eyes of Accusation
+
+     XI. The $1,000 Check
+
+    XII. The Man with the Gold Tooth
+
+   XIII. Lucy Thomas Talks
+
+    XIV. The Pawn Broker Takes the Trail
+
+     XV. Braceway Sees a Light
+
+    XVI. A Message from Miss Fulton
+
+   XVII. Miss Fulton's Revelation
+
+  XVIII. What's Braceway's Game?
+
+    XIX. At the Anderson National Bank
+
+     XX. The Discovery of the Jewels
+
+    XXI. Bristow Solves a Problem
+
+   XXII. A Confession
+
+  XXIII. On the Rack
+
+   XXIV.  Miss Fulton Writes a Letter
+
+    XXV. A Mystifying Telegram
+
+   XXVI. Wanted: Vengeance
+
+  XXVII. The Revelation
+
+ XXVIII. Confession Voluntary
+
+   XXIX. The Last Card
+
+
+
+
+THE WINNING CLUE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+STRANGLED
+
+
+When a woman's voice, pitched to the high note of utter terror, rang out
+on the late morning quiet of Manniston Road, Lawrence Bristow looked up
+from his newspaper quickly but vaguely, as if he doubted his own ears. He
+was reading an account of a murder committed in Waukesha, Wisconsin, and
+the shrieks he had just heard fitted in so well with the paragraph then
+before his eyes that his imagination might have been playing him tricks.
+He was allowed, however, little time for speculation or doubt.
+
+"Murder! Help!" cried the woman in a staccato sharpness that carried the
+length of many blocks.
+
+Bristow sprang to his feet and started down the short flight of stairs
+leading from his porch to the street. Before he had taken three steps, he
+saw the frightened girl standing on the porch of No. 5, two doors to his
+left. Although he was lame, he displayed surprising agility. His left
+leg, two inches shorter than the right and supported by a steel brace
+from foot to thigh, did not prevent his being the first to reach the
+young woman's side.
+
+Late as it was, half-past ten, she was not fully dressed. She wore a
+kimono of light, sheer material which, clutched spasmodically about her,
+revealed the slightness and grace of her figure. Her fair hair hung down
+her back in a long, thick braid.
+
+Neighbours across the street and further up Manniston Road were out on
+their porches now or starting toward No. 5. All of them were women.
+
+The girl--she was barely past twenty, he thought--stopped screaming, and,
+her hands pressed to her throat and cheeks, stared wildly from him toward
+the front door, which was standing open. He entered the living room of
+the one-story bungalow. A foot within the doorway, he stood stock still.
+On the sofa against the opposite wall he saw another woman. He knew at
+first glance that she was dead.
+
+The body was in a curious position. Apparently, before death had come,
+the victim had been sitting on the sofa, and, in dying, her body had
+crumpled over from the waist toward the right, so that now the lower part
+of her occupied the attitude of sitting while the upper half reclined as
+if in the posture of natural sleep. One thing which, perhaps, added to
+the gruesomeness of the sight was that she had on evening dress, a gown
+of pale blue satin embellished in unerring taste with real old Irish
+lace.
+
+Although the face had been beautiful under its crown of luxuriant black
+hair, it now was distorted. While the eyes were closed, the mouth was
+open, very wide--an ugly, repulsive gape.
+
+He was aware that the woman in the kimono was just behind him--he could
+feel her hot breath against the back of his neck--and that behind her
+pressed the neighbours, their number augmented by the arrival of two men.
+He turned and faced them.
+
+"Call a doctor--and the police, somebody, will you?" he said sharply.
+
+"They have a telephone back there in the dining room," volunteered one of
+the women on the porch.
+
+Another, a Mrs. Allen who lived in No. 6, had put her arms around the
+terrified girl and was forcing her into an armchair on the porch.
+
+The others started into the living room.
+
+"Wait a moment," cautioned Bristow. "Don't come in here yet. The police
+will want to find things undisturbed. It looks like murder."
+
+They obeyed him without question. He was about forty years old, of medium
+height and with good shoulders, but his chest was too flat, and his face
+showed an unnatural flush. His mere physique was not one to force
+obedience from others. It was in his eyes, dark-brown and lit with a
+peculiar flaming intensity, that they read his right to command.
+
+"Please go through this room to the telephone and call a doctor," he
+said, singling out the woman who had spoken.
+
+His voice, a deep barytone with a pleasant note, was perfectly steady. He
+seemed to hold their excitement easily within bounds.
+
+The woman he had addressed complied with his suggestion. While she was
+doing so, he crossed over to the sofa and put his hand to the wrist of
+the murdered woman. In order to do that, he had to move a fold of the
+gown which partially concealed it. The flesh was cold, and he shivered
+slightly, readjusting the satin to exactly the fold in which he had found
+it.
+
+"Too late for a doctor to help now," he threw back over his shoulder.
+
+They watched him silently. Low moans were coming constantly from the
+woman in the chair on the porch.
+
+Bristow took the telephone in his turn and called up police headquarters.
+
+The chief of police, whom he knew, answered the call.
+
+"Hello! Captain Greenleaf?" asked the lame man.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"There's been a murder at Number Five, Manniston Road. This is Lawrence
+Bristow, of Number Nine."
+
+"Aw, quit your kiddin'," laughed Greenleaf. "What do you want to do, get
+me up there to hear another of your theories about----"
+
+"This is no joke," snapped Bristow. "I tell you one of the women in
+Number Five has been murdered. Come----"
+
+But the chief, recognizing the urgency in the summons, had left the
+telephone and was on his way.
+
+As Bristow turned toward the living room, Mrs. Allen and another woman
+were carrying the hysterical, moaning girl from the front porch to one
+of the two bedrooms in the bungalow. Some of the others again started
+into the living room.
+
+"Let's wait," he cautioned once more. "If we get to moving around in here
+we may destroy any clues that could be used later."
+
+When they fell back a little, he joined them on the porch, standing
+always so that he could watch the body and see that no one changed its
+attitude or even approached it. His eyes studied keenly all the furniture
+in the room. Save for one overturned stiff-backed chair, it apparently
+had not been disturbed.
+
+The doctor arrived and, waiting for no information, approached the
+murdered woman. As Bristow had done, he touched her wrist, and then
+slipped his hand beneath her corsage so that it rested above her heart.
+He straightened up almost immediately.
+
+"Dead," he said to Bristow; "dead for hours."
+
+The physician became conscious of the hysterical girl's moans, took a
+step toward the bedrooms and paused.
+
+"That's right, doctor," Bristow told him. "They need you back there."
+
+The doctor hurried out.
+
+"That is--that was Mrs. Withers, wasn't it?" Bristow, looking at the dead
+body, asked of the group.
+
+"Yes; and the other is her sister, Miss Fulton," one of them answered.
+
+Bristow had seemed to all of them a peculiar man--too quiet and
+reserved--ever since he had come to No. 9 four months before. They
+remembered this now, when he seemed scarcely conscious of the identity of
+the two girls who had lived almost next door to him during all that time.
+
+Different members of the crowd gave him information: Miss Maria Fulton,
+like nearly everybody else on Manniston Road, had tuberculosis, and Mrs.
+Withers had been living with her. They had plenty of money--not rich,
+perhaps, but able to have all the comforts and most of the luxuries of
+life. They were here in the hope that Furmville's climate would restore
+Miss Fulton's health.
+
+Their coloured cook-and-maid had not come to work that morning, it
+seemed, and Miss Fulton, who was the younger of the two sisters, was on
+the "rest" cure, ordered by the doctor to stay in bed day and night.
+Perhaps that was why she had not discovered Mrs. Withers' body earlier in
+the day.
+
+They gossiped on.
+
+It was like a lesson in immortality--the dead body, with distorted face
+and twisted limbs, just inside the room; and outside, in the low-toned
+phrases of the awed women, swift and vivid pictures of what she; when
+alive, had said and done and seemed.
+
+"Everybody liked her. If somebody had come and told me a woman living on
+Manniston Road had been killed, she would have been the last one I'd have
+thought of as the victim." "All the other beautiful women I ever knew
+were stupid; she wasn't." "Her husband couldn't come to Furmville very
+often." "Loveliest black hair I _ever_ saw." "She used to be----"
+
+Then followed quick glimpses of her life as they had seen or heard it: a
+dance at Maplewood Inn where she had been the undisputed belle; a novel
+she had liked; a big reception at the White House in Washington when,
+during the year of her debut, the French ambassador had called her "the
+most beautiful American," and the newspapers had made much of it; an
+emerald ring she had worn; the unfailing good humour she had always shown
+in the tedious routine of nursing her sister--and so on, a mass of facts
+and impressions which were, simultaneously, a little biography of her and
+an unaffected appreciation of the way she had touched and coloured their
+lives.
+
+Captain Greenleaf, with one of the plain-clothes men of his force, came
+hurrying up the steps. The crowd fell back, gave them passage, and closed
+in again.
+
+"Nothing's been disturbed, captain," said Bristow.
+
+"Where is she?" asked Greenleaf anxiously. He was not accustomed to
+murder cases.
+
+He caught sight of the body on the sofa.
+
+"God!" he said in a low tone, and turned toward the plain-clothes man:
+
+"Come on in, Jenkins--you, too, Mr. Bristow."
+
+The three entered the living room, and Greenleaf, with a muttered word of
+apology to the on-lookers, closed the door in their faces.
+
+He, too, did what Bristow had done--put his fingers on the dead woman's
+wrist. He was breathing rapidly, and his hand shook. Jenkins stood
+motionless. He also was overwhelmed by the tragedy. Besides, he was not
+cut out for work of this kind. In looking for illicit distillers and
+boot-leggers, or negroes charged with theft, he was in his element, but
+this sort of thing was new to him. He had no idea of where to turn or
+what to do.
+
+"She's dead," Bristow said to the captain. "The doctor says she has been
+dead a long time--hours."
+
+"Where's the doctor?"
+
+"Back there. Miss Fulton, the sister, is hysterical with fright."
+
+"Who sent for the doctor?"
+
+"I did. I asked one of the women here to telephone."
+
+"Then I'll call the coroner."
+
+He stepped through the open folding doors into the dining room and
+took down the receiver, looking, as he did so, at the body and its
+surroundings.
+
+Bristow stooped down, picked up something from the floor near the sofa
+and dropped it into his vest pocket.
+
+The doctor--Dr. Braley--returned as the captain hung up the telephone
+receiver.
+
+"Miss Fulton is quieter now," he announced.
+
+"Doctor," requested Greenleaf, "look at this body, will you? What caused
+death?"
+
+Braley, a thin, quick-moving little man of thirty-five, bent over the
+dead woman, lifted one of her eyelids, and examined her throat as far as
+was possible without moving the head.
+
+"She was choked to death," he gave his opinion. "Although the eyes are
+closed, you see the effect they produce of almost starting from their
+sockets. And the tongue protrudes. Besides, there are the marks on her
+throat. You can see them there on the left side."
+
+"How long has she been dead?"
+
+"I can't say definitely. I should guess about eight or ten hours anyway."
+
+That staggered Greenleaf, the idea of this woman dead here in the front
+room of a bungalow on Manniston Road for eight or ten hours--and nobody
+knew anything about it! His agitation grew. He felt the need of doing
+something, starting something.
+
+"How about Miss Fulton?" he asked. "Can I get a statement from her?"
+
+"Not just yet. Give her a little more time to get herself together.
+Besides, she told me something about the--er--affair. Most remarkable
+statement--most remarkable."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"She says," related Braley, "that she only discovered the dead body of
+her sister a few minutes before she was heard crying for help. Her
+sister, Mrs. Withers, went to a dance, one of the regular Monday night
+dances at the inn--Maplewood Inn. She went with Mr. Campbell, Douglas
+Campbell, the real estate man here. You know him. They left the house at
+nine o'clock last night. That was the last time Miss Fulton saw Mrs.
+Withers alive.
+
+"In the meantime, Miss Fulton herself, who is under my orders to stay in
+bed all the time, was up and dressed so that she might spend the evening
+with a friend of hers from Washington. His name is Henry Morley. He left
+this house a little after eleven o'clock, and he left Furmville on the
+midnight train for Washington.
+
+"Miss Fulton, thoroughly tired out, went to bed and was asleep by
+half-past eleven. As she has something which she uses when she wants a
+good sleep, she took some of it last night and did not wake up until
+after ten this morning. She didn't even hear her sister come in last
+night.
+
+"When she awoke this morning, she called her sister. Amazed by receiving
+no answer, she got up to investigate. Mrs. Withers' bed had not been
+occupied. She then came in here and found the body."
+
+"You mean to say," put in Bristow, "that this sick girl was here all
+night and heard nothing?"
+
+"That's what she says," confirmed the physician.
+
+"Did she give any idea who the murderer might be?" queried Greenleaf.
+
+"No; she's not sufficiently clear in her mind to advance any theories
+yet--naturally."
+
+"Let me look around," suggested the captain.
+
+He did so, followed by Bristow and the doctor. Save for the overturned
+chair, between the sofa and the dining room door, the furniture, for the
+most part the mission stuff generally found in the furnished-for-rent
+cottages in Furmville, had not been knocked about in a struggle. That was
+evident. The two rugs on the floor had not been disturbed. None of the
+three men touched the overturned chair.
+
+All the windows of the living room and the dining room were closed but
+not locked, as there was on the outside of each the usual covering of
+mosquito wiring. The shades were down. The front door did not have the
+inside "catch" thrown on.
+
+Greenleaf examined the kitchen, the unoccupied bedroom, the bathroom, and
+the sleeping porch at the back of the house. This last, like the windows,
+was inclosed in stout wire screens, and nowhere, on either the windows or
+the sleeping porch, had this screening been broken. The kitchen door was
+locked. There was no sign of a struggle anywhere. These negative facts
+were gathered quickly.
+
+Mrs. Allen, summoned from the sister's side, reported that there were no
+signs of an entrance having been made through any of the three windows
+in the bedroom in which Miss Fulton now lay quiet.
+
+They made their way back to the living room. In spite of the most
+painstaking examination of the floor, walls, and furniture of the entire
+bungalow, they were, so far, without a clue. The murderer had left not
+the slightest trace of his identity or his manner of entrance to the
+death chamber.
+
+"As I see it," said the captain when they rejoined Jenkins, "nobody broke
+into this house last night. But two men had admission to it. They were
+Mr. Douglas Campbell, the real estate man, and Mr. Henry Morley, who was
+calling on Miss Fulton. It's up to those two to tell what they know."
+
+"But," objected the doctor, "Miss Fulton says Morley left town last
+night."
+
+"Humph! Maybe that makes it look all the worse for Morley."
+
+"But," suggested Bristow, "if we find that the front door was unlocked
+all night, the possibilities broaden."
+
+"How will we find that out?"
+
+"Miss Fulton might remember about it."
+
+"She did mention that," put in Braley; "it was unlocked."
+
+"All the same," insisted Greenleaf, "Morley's got to come back here.
+Wouldn't you say so?" This question was addressed to Bristow.
+
+The telephone bell rang in the dining room. The chief went to answer it.
+
+"What's that?" Those in the living room heard him. "You? I'm the chief of
+police. Where are you now? Oh, I see. Come up here, will you? There's
+been a murder here. Mrs. Withers. Right away? All right; I'll wait for
+you."
+
+He came back to the living room.
+
+"That was Mr. Henry Morley," he said, "Didn't leave town last night. What
+do you think of that?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+"SOMETHING BIG IN IT"
+
+
+Before the question was answered the coroner arrived. While Chief
+Greenleaf told him the circumstances confronting them, Dr. Braley
+telephoned for a trained nurse for Miss Fulton. In the absence of anybody
+else to perform the unpleasant task, the doctor went back to take up with
+the bereaved girl the matter of telegraphing to her family and the
+details of preparing the murdered woman's body for burial as soon as
+would be compatible with the plans of the coroner.
+
+"I wonder, Mr. Bristow," suggested Greenleaf, "if I couldn't walk up to
+your place with you and talk this thing over."
+
+"Glad to have you," agreed Bristow.
+
+The crowd on the porch and in the street began to disperse slowly after
+the chief had told them none of them could be admitted. In small groups,
+they made their way to porches or into houses where they lingered,
+speculating, wondering, advancing impossible theories.
+
+Why had death singled _her_ out? Who would ever have suspected that there
+had been in her life any foothold for tragedy? The secrecy with which she
+had been struck down, the ease of the murderer's coming and going safely,
+roused their resentment. They sympathized with themselves as well as with
+the dead woman.
+
+Confusedly, but at the same time with striking unanimity, they felt that
+this was not merely a mystery, but a mystery made ugly and shocking by
+base motives and despicable agents. In common with all mankind, they
+resented mystery. It emphasized their own dependence on chance. They
+began to guess at the best method for capturing the guilty.
+
+The chief of police and the lame man had reached the porch of No. 9.
+There Bristow picked up from a table a scrapbook and a bundle of
+newspaper clippings. Following him into the living room, Greenleaf
+brought a paste pot and a pair of shears which the other evidently had
+been using in placing the clippings in the big book. He put them down on
+a table in one corner near Bristow's typewriter.
+
+"Still figuring 'em out, I see," he said grimly.
+
+He referred to Bristow's habit of reading murder mysteries in the
+newspapers and working them out to satisfactory solutions. That was
+Bristow's way of amusing himself while set down in Furmville for the long
+struggle to overcome the tuberculosis with which he was afflicted. In
+fact, as a result of this recreation, he had become known to Greenleaf,
+who had visited him several times.
+
+He had rendered the captain considerable assistance in a minor case
+shortly after his arrival in the town, and Greenleaf was really amazed by
+the correctness of the lame man's solutions of most of the murder cases
+chronicled. He knew that Bristow had been right on an average of nine
+times out of ten, often clearing up the affairs on paper many days or
+even weeks ahead of the authorities in various parts of the country.
+
+Bristow had his records in his scrapbooks to prove his contentions. Under
+each clipping descriptive of a baffling murder he had written a brief
+outline of his solving of the case and dated it, following this with the
+date of the correct or incorrect solutions by the authorities.
+
+"But now," the chief added, as they sat down before the open fire, which
+earlier had fought against the chill of the cool May morning, "you can
+work one out right on the ground. And I'll be mighty glad to have your
+help--if you will help."
+
+"Of course," said Bristow. "I'll be more than glad to make any
+suggestions I can."
+
+The chief went out on the porch and called across the yard of No. 7 to
+one of his men on guard at No. 5:
+
+"Simpson, when a young man--name's Morley--gets there and asks for me,
+tell him to come up here to Number Nine."
+
+He came back and referred to Bristow's offer of help:
+
+"For instance?"
+
+"Well," Bristow answered, "as we see it now, there are three
+possibilities: Campbell, or Morley, or some unknown man or woman,
+coloured or white, bent on robbery."
+
+"So far, though, we haven't found any signs of robbery."
+
+"I have."
+
+"What were they?"
+
+"The middle, third and little fingers of Mrs. Withers' left hand were
+scratched, badly scratched, as if rings had been pulled from them by
+force. And there was a deep line on the back of her neck. It looked black
+just now, but it was red when it was inflicted. It was too thin to have
+been made by a finger, but it might have been caused by somebody's having
+tugged at a chain about her neck until it broke."
+
+"The thunder you say! I didn't notice any of that."
+
+"I'll show you the marks when we go back there."
+
+"But," objected Greenleaf, "I know Mr. Campbell. He's not the sort to
+steal. And I don't suppose Morley is."
+
+"They say the same thing about bank presidents," Bristow replied with a
+slight smile, "but some of them get caught at it, nevertheless."
+
+"Yes; but this is different--unless the murdered woman had extremely
+valuable jewelry."
+
+"That's true. Besides, if the front door was unlocked all night, or, even
+if somebody knocked at the door and Mrs. Withers answered it, there is
+your third possibility, any ordinary robbery and murder."
+
+"I believe that's what will come out," Greenleaf said, his troubled face
+showing his worried consciousness of inability to handle the situation;
+"but how will we--how will I prove it?"
+
+"Morley and Campbell can make their own statements."
+
+Bristow, going to the dining room door, called toward the kitchen:
+
+"Mattie!"
+
+Replying to his summons, a middle-aged coloured woman appeared.
+
+"Mattie, didn't I hear Perry tell you yesterday that he was to go to work
+this morning for Mrs. Withers, 'making' her garden?"
+
+"Yas, suh," answered Mattie, still breathing heavily from her hurried
+return from No. 5.
+
+"Has he been around this morning?"
+
+"Naw, suh."
+
+"Do you know where Mrs. Withers' servant lives?"
+
+"Yas, suh."
+
+"What's her name?"
+
+"Lucy Thomas, suh."
+
+"Well, I want you to go there right away and find out what's the matter
+with her, why she didn't show up for work this morning. Take your time.
+Dinner can wait."
+
+When Mattie had gone, Bristow explained:
+
+"This Perry--Perry Carpenter--is a young negro who does odd jobs in this
+section. He's about twenty-five, I guess. Each of these bungalows has a
+garden back of it, you know. There are no houses behind us. I don't like
+Perry's looks. He did some gardening for me Saturday and yesterday."
+
+"You think he----?"
+
+"He's got a bad face. If neither Campbell nor Morley killed Mrs. Withers,
+why shouldn't we find out where Perry and the servant woman of Number
+Five are now, and where they were all last night?"
+
+"I reckon that's right," chimed in Greenleaf. "It looks something like a
+common darky job at that."
+
+"And this," added Bristow, taking something from his vest pocket and
+handing it to the chief of police, "looks more like it, doesn't it?"
+
+Greenleaf examined the object the other had put into his hand. It was a
+metal button of the kind ordinarily worn on overall jumpers, and clinging
+to it were a few fragments of the dark blue stuff of which overalls are
+commonly made. On the back of the button were stamped in white the words:
+"National Overalls Company."
+
+"Where did you get this?" asked the chief.
+
+"I picked it up in the room where the dead girl was; and I'd forgotten it
+until this minute. It was on the floor a few yards from the body. You saw
+me when I picked it up. You were at the telephone."
+
+"That's right. I remember now. By cracky! That came off of some darky's
+working clothes. That's sure!"
+
+"The only trouble is," puzzled Bristow, "your negro doesn't wear overalls
+at night after he has finished work. He dresses up and loafs down town."
+
+"That's true on Saturday nights. Other nights they don't take the trouble
+to change. And last night was Monday night. No, sir! That's our first
+clue, that button; the first sign we've had of the murderer."
+
+"Keep it," Bristow told him. "I'm not as confident as you are, but you
+might have a look at the blouse of Perry's suit of overalls. We can't
+over-look anything now."
+
+Deep in thought he gazed at the fire. Greenleaf got up and walked to the
+window, which gave a magnificent view of the great Carolina mountains in
+the distance. He was not admiring the mountains, however. He was
+wondering why Mr. Morley had not arrived.
+
+"By the way," he said, "can't I get a drink of water?"
+
+He was in the dining room on his way to the kitchen before Bristow roused
+himself from his reverie.
+
+"Wait!" he called to the chief. "Let me get it for you."
+
+Greenleaf, however, had gone into the kitchen. Bristow followed him and
+took a tumbler from a rack on the wall.
+
+The chief drew the tumbler full twice from the faucet and gulped down the
+water. His hand shook. He was very nervous.
+
+As they turned to leave the kitchen, he uttered an exclamation and,
+stooping down swiftly, pulled something from under the stove. When he
+straightened up, he had in his hand another metal button. He turned it
+about in his fingers, studying it.
+
+"It looks like the one you found in Number Five," he said.
+
+They compared the two. They were identical. The two men stared at each
+other.
+
+"What do you make of that?" asked Greenleaf.
+
+"I was wondering," Bristow replied, thinking quickly, "when--how that got
+there." He paused and added: "Mattie doesn't wear overalls."
+
+They returned to the living room.
+
+"But," he continued, "Perry was working for me yesterday. He was in the
+kitchen talking to Mattie. I wonder--Well, there's one thing; if Perry's
+blouse has two buttons missing, he'll be confronted with the job of
+establishing an alibi for all of last night."
+
+"By cracky!" The captain slapped his hands together in evident relief.
+"I believe we've got him! I'm going to send a man after him."
+
+He went out to the porch and signalled another of his men.
+
+"Drake," he said, "I want you to find a young negro--name's Perry
+Carpenter--about twenty-five years old. He does odd jobs around here. Any
+of these other niggers can tell you where he lives. When you find him,
+take him to headquarters. Keep him there until I come. Get him. Don't
+lose him!"
+
+When he stepped back into the house, Bristow was regarding him with a
+smile.
+
+"I hope you're right," he told the chief, "but I've a hunch you're wrong.
+I believe this murder is more than an ordinary robbery by a darky.
+Somehow, I have the impression that there's something big mixed up in
+it."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I can't say exactly. Perhaps it's because I've been thinking of the
+beauty of the victim. Or it may be that I was impressed by what the women
+said about her when we were waiting for you on the porch."
+
+He thought a while, and decided that he had no explanation of why he
+had made the remark. He had not meant to say it. It had come from him
+spontaneously, like an endorsement of what all Manniston Road was saying
+at that very moment: the "the something big in it" loomed up, intangible
+but demanding notice.
+
+Greenleaf himself, for all his apparent certainty about the guilt of the
+negro Perry, sensed vaguely the possibility, the hint, that this crime
+was even worse than it appeared to be. But he would not admit it. He
+preferred to keep before his mind the easier answer to the puzzle.
+
+"No," he contradicted Bristow; "I believe Perry's the fellow we want.
+Here we are dealing with facts, not story-book romances."
+
+Just then a young man sprang up the steps of No. 9 and knocked on the
+door. It was Henry Morley, come to give weight to Bristow's "hunch."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE RUBY RING
+
+
+Although it was Chief Greenleaf who opened the door, it was to Bristow
+that Morley turned, as if he instinctively recognized the superiority of
+the lame man's personality. Greenleaf, of average height and weight, had
+nothing of command or domination about him. With his red, weatherbeaten
+face and mild, expressionless blue eyes, he looked like a well-to-do
+farmer. He was suggestive of no acquaintance with Tarde, Lombroso or any
+other authorities on crime and criminals.
+
+"Won't you sit down?" invited Bristow.
+
+The new-comer was tall and slender. In spite of a straight, high-bridged
+nose and thin lips, his face indicated weakness. His dark-gray eyes had
+in them either a great deal of worry or undisguised fear. As he took the
+chair pointed out to him, he was being catalogued by Bristow as showing
+too much uncertainty, even a womanish timidity. Bristow noticed also that
+his thick, soft blond hair was carefully parted and brushed, and that his
+fingers were much manicured.
+
+He breathed in short, quick gasps.
+
+"What is it? How--how did it happen?" he asked, his gaze still on
+Bristow.
+
+Greenleaf took a seat so that Morley sat between him and Bristow.
+
+"We don't know how it happened," said the chief. "We wanted to know if
+you could tell us anything."
+
+"I didn't see Mrs. Withers late last night," Morley replied, a nervous
+tremor in his voice.
+
+"Nobody said you did," commented Bristow.
+
+"No; I know that," Morley agreed in a queer, high voice.
+
+"But you were in the house, Number Five, last evening, weren't you?"
+Bristow inquired.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, tell us about it."
+
+"I came down here from Washington Saturday," the young man began. "I
+didn't come to see Mrs. Withers. I came to see Miss Fulton, her sister.
+Of course, I've seen Mrs. Withers since I've been here; I saw her early
+last night. You see, last night she went up to the Maplewood Inn for the
+dinner dance, and, when I called, she was just leaving with a Mr.
+Campbell. Miss Fulton and I sat on the front porch and in the parlour
+talking until a little after eleven."
+
+"We understood," put in Bristow, "that Miss Fulton was confined to her
+bed."
+
+"She was, that is--er--she was supposed to be; but she got up last
+evening and dressed to receive me."
+
+"I beg your pardon," again interrupted his questioner, "but everything is
+important here now, and we need information. We have so little of it as
+yet. I really apologize, but may I ask what your relations with Miss
+Fulton are?"
+
+Morley hesitated a full minute before he answered.
+
+"If it is to go no further than you gentlemen," he began.
+
+"Of course," the other two agreed.
+
+"Well, then, Miss Fulton and I are engaged to be married."
+
+"Ah! Go ahead." This from the lame man.
+
+"As I said, we talked until a little after eleven. Then I had to leave to
+catch the midnight train back to Washington."
+
+"But you didn't catch it."
+
+"No. You see, I was stopping at the Maplewood. That's more than a mile
+from Manniston Road, and it's fully two miles from the railroad station.
+Somehow, I didn't allow myself enough time, and I missed the train by a
+bare two minutes."
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"What did I do then?"
+
+"Yes--what then?"
+
+"I didn't go back to Maplewood Inn. I took a room for the night at the
+Brevord Hotel. It's near the station, you know, and I intended to catch
+the midday train today. Besides, it was late, and I didn't want to take
+the trouble of walking back or getting a machine to take me back to
+Maplewood."
+
+He drew out his handkerchief and mopped his forehead, which, as a matter
+of fact, was perfectly dry. He was tremendously unstrung. Bristow
+realized this and saw that now, more than at any subsequent time, he
+would be able to make the young man talk.
+
+"That," he said easily, "accounts for you, doesn't it? Now, I'll tell
+you. Chief Greenleaf and I are anxious to get some information about
+the Fulton family. As you know, we people here, being invalids, live
+pretty much to ourselves. We don't have the strength for much social
+life, and we don't know much about each other. What can you tell us?"
+
+"Miss Fulton and Mrs. Withers are--were sisters," Morley responded.
+"Their father, William T. Fulton, is a real estate man in Washington. By
+the way, Mar--Miss Fulton expects him here this afternoon. She told me so
+yesterday. Last fall, just before Miss Fulton was taken sick with
+tuberculosis, he failed, failed for a very large amount of money."
+
+"He was wealthy then?"
+
+"Yes; quite. Mrs. Withers was twenty-five. She married Withers, George S.
+Withers, of Atlanta, Georgia, when she was twenty-one. But, when Miss
+Fulton had to come here for her health, Mrs. Withers agreed to come, too,
+and look after her. Withers isn't wealthy. He's a lawyer in Atlanta, but
+he hasn't a big income."
+
+"How old is Miss Fulton?" asked Bristow.
+
+"Twenty-three."
+
+"Do you know whether Mrs. Withers had any valuable jewelry--rings, stuff
+of that kind?"
+
+Morley was for a moment visibly disturbed.
+
+"Why, yes," he answered after a little pause. "When Mr. Fulton failed,
+Miss Fulton gave up all her jewels, everything, to help meet his debts.
+Mrs. Withers refused to do this--at least, she didn't do it."
+
+Both Bristow and Greenleaf caught the note of criticism in his voice.
+
+"Just what was the feeling between the two sisters?" pursued Bristow.
+
+Again Morley paused.
+
+"Oh, all right, if you don't feel like discussing that," his interrogator
+said smoothly. "It's of no consequence. We'll find out about it
+elsewhere."
+
+"I suppose I might as well," said Morley. "It really doesn't amount to
+anything much. There has been considerable coolness between the two
+women."
+
+"Even when Mrs. Withers was here nursing Miss Fulton?"
+
+"Yes. You see, Mrs. Withers was and always has been Mr. Fulton's
+favourite. Miss Maria Fulton felt this, and she knew that Mrs. Withers
+came here only because Mr. Fulton asked her to do it. Also, Miss Fulton
+never forgave Mrs. Withers for not coming forward with her jewels, jewels
+which her father had given her--for not coming forward with them when he
+failed."
+
+"Did they ever quarrel?"
+
+"Well, yes. Sometimes, I think, they did. You know how it is with two
+women, particularly sisters, who are on what might be called bad terms.
+Then, as I was about to say, Mrs. Withers wasn't making any sacrifice by
+being here with her sister. Mr. Fulton, in spite of his reduced means,
+paid her expenses, all of them. Besides, Mrs. Withers had quite a good
+time here, going to the dances, and so on."
+
+"Do you know, Mr. Morley, whether they had a quarrel yesterday?"
+
+"They didn't so far as I know."
+
+"Miss Fulton said nothing to you about a quarrel?"
+
+"No."
+
+Bristow was silent a few seconds.
+
+"I think that's all, Mr. Morley. We're much obliged to you. Isn't that
+all, chief?"
+
+"Yes, for the present," Greenleaf answered with a long breath, thankful
+the other had been there to do the questioning. "That seems to cover
+everything."
+
+"I wonder if I could see Miss Fulton," Morley said, rising.
+
+"If the doctor will allow it," Greenleaf told him. "You might go down
+there and see."
+
+Morley put his hand on the doorknob.
+
+"By the way," interjected Bristow once more, and this time his voice was
+cold, steely; "Mr. Morley, did you wear rubbers last night?"
+
+"Rubbers?" parroted Morley.
+
+"Yes--rubbers."
+
+Morley stared a moment, as if calculating something.
+
+"Why, yes; I believe I did," he said finally.
+
+Greenleaf, glancing down at Morley's feet, noticed what Bristow had seen
+three seconds after Morley had entered the room--his feet were large,
+abnormally large for a man of his build. He must have worn a number ten
+or, perhaps, a number eleven shoe.
+
+"I thought so," Bristow observed carelessly. "I sleep out on my sleeping
+porch at the back of the house here, and I knew it rained hard from early
+in the night until seven this morning."
+
+Morley, without commenting on this, looked at the two men.
+
+"Is there anything more?" he inquired.
+
+"No, nothing more; thanks," said Bristow.
+
+The young man went out quickly, slamming the door in his haste.
+
+Bristow answered Greenleaf's questioning look:
+
+"There was no use in our looking round the outside of the house for
+possible footprints this morning. If there had been any, the rain would
+have cleared them away. But, when I first ran up on the porch--it's
+roofed, like mine here--I noticed the dried marks made by a wet shoe
+hours before, a large shoe, by a large shoe with a rubber sole, or
+by a rubber shoe."
+
+"The devil you did!"
+
+"I did.--But it may turn out that Perry, or somebody else, or several
+other people, wore rubber shoes, or rubber-soled shoes last night.
+Negroes always have large feet."
+
+"Well, I hope my man's found this Perry nigger," said the chief. "He's
+the fellow we want."
+
+"And yet," ruminated Bristow, "what young Morley said is interesting
+enough--two quarreling sisters living together--one decked in jewels, the
+other deprived of them--the jewels gone this morning." He smiled and
+waved his hands comprehensively. "As long as it _is_ a mystery, let's
+have it a real mystery. Let's look at all sides of it. There's Perry.
+There's Morley. And--there's Miss Maria Fulton."
+
+"Miss Fulton!"
+
+"Yes--a possibility."
+
+"Oh, I don't connect her up with it any." The chief's voice was tinged
+with ridicule.
+
+Bristow answered a knock on the door and opened to admit a uniformed
+policeman.
+
+"Beg your pardon, chief," said the officer, "but I had something for a
+Mr. Morley. The men on guard down there at Number Five wouldn't let me
+in to see him--said I'd better see you."
+
+"What have you got, Avery?" asked Greenleaf.
+
+"It's a little package. You know, I'm on that beat down there. Takes in
+the Brevord Hotel. The clerk said this Mr. Morley had sent his grips to
+the station, but had said he was coming up to Number Five, Manniston
+Road. He said there had been a murder up here. The clerk said he didn't
+know what to do with this property but turn it over to the police. As
+soon as I saw what it was, I hurried up here."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It's a ring, sir."
+
+"A ring!" exclaimed Bristow. "Let's see it."
+
+Policeman Avery handed Bristow a tissue paper package.
+
+The lame man unwound the paper and discovered a woman's ring, the setting
+a tremendous pigeon's-blood ruby flanked on each side by a diamond. It
+was an exceedingly handsome and very valuable piece of jewelry.
+
+"Where did the clerk get this?" Bristow asked swiftly.
+
+For the first time, he was visibly excited.
+
+"A maid found it under the bed on the floor of Mr. Morley's room at the
+Brevord," answered Avery.
+
+Greenleaf needed no hint from Bristow this time.
+
+"Avery," he said, "your beat takes in the railroad station. Go down to
+Number Five and get a good look at this man Morley. After that, if he
+attempts to leave Furmville, arrest him."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+TWO TRAILS
+
+
+"I'm afraid," said Bristow, after the policeman had hurried out, "we made
+a mistake in permitting Morley to talk to Miss Fulton just at present."
+
+"I can go down there and interrupt them," Greenleaf volunteered.
+
+The lame man reflected, a forefinger against the right side of his nose,
+the attitude emphasizing the fact that this feature was perceptibly
+crooked, bent toward the left.
+
+"No," he concluded. "We'd probably be too late." Then he added, "And we
+didn't find out Morley's employment or profession in Washington--but
+we can do that later."
+
+The chief of police prepared to leave, saying he was going to call at
+Douglas Campbell's office and from there go to headquarters in the hope
+that Perry had been found.
+
+"Can't you come with me?" he invited.
+
+"It's against the doctor's orders," Bristow replied. "He tells me not to
+leave this house or its porches. If I started to run around with you, I'd
+be exhausted in an hour. But I'll tell you what: this afternoon, after
+you've talked to Campbell and the darky, suppose you come back here, and
+we'll drop down to interview Miss Fulton ourselves."
+
+This surprised Greenleaf.
+
+"You mean you suspect----"
+
+Bristow laughed.
+
+"Oh," he countered lightly, "we've enough suspecting to do already.
+There's Perry--and there's Morley. Don't let's complicate it too much.
+But what Miss Fulton has to say may be valuable. By the way, if I should
+need to do so, how can I persuade anybody that I have authority to ask
+questions, or to do anything else in this matter?"
+
+The captain thought a moment.
+
+"I'll appoint you to the plain-clothes squad. I appoint you now, and the
+city commissioners will confirm it. They meet tonight. You're on the
+force--at a nominal salary--say ten dollars a week. That suit you?"
+
+"Perfectly," consented Bristow. "What I want is the power to help in case
+I have the opportunity."
+
+Greenleaf went out to the porch, followed by Bristow, and started down
+the steps.
+
+"By the way," his new employee said in a cautious tone, "don't forget to
+stop at Number Five and look for those scratches, on the fingers and the
+neck."
+
+"By cracky!" exclaimed the chief. "I'd forgotten all about it. I'll do
+that right away."
+
+Looking toward No. 5, Bristow saw a hearse-like wagon drawing up in front
+of the door. The coroner had already made arrangements for the removal of
+the body of Mrs. Withers to an undertaking establishment.
+
+The lame man went slowly into the house and stood at the window, staring
+at the mountains. In the clear, newly washed air, they looked like the
+soft, tumbling waves of some magically blue sea.
+
+Like most retiring, secluded men, he had his vanity in pronounced degree.
+He saw himself now, the dominant figure in this city of thirty thousand
+people, the man who had been selected by the chief of police as the one
+able to unravel the web of mystery surrounding this startling murder. The
+thought pleased him, and he smiled. He began to think about himself and
+about life as a general proposition.
+
+Everything was always so mixed up, so involved. People talked of a divine
+providence, of the law that virtue is rewarded, of the rule that to do
+good is to have good done to one. He smiled again. If all that was true,
+what explanation was there for the murder of this woman, this beauty
+whose good nature, kindness, and cleverness had endeared her to all with
+whom she came in contact?
+
+He had heard the women on the porch of No. 5 say that everybody had loved
+her. Why, then, had some ignorant negro or some white man bent on robbery
+been permitted to steal up on her in the dead of night and crush out her
+life? Was there any reason, any logic, any mercy in that?
+
+He drummed on the window-pane with his fingertips and whistled, scarcely
+audibly, a fragment of tune. His pursed up mouth made it clear that he
+was not a handsome man--the lower lip was heavy, somewhat protuberant.
+
+Pshaw! There was only one rule of life that held good, so far as he had
+been able to see. Strength and persistence accomplished things and
+brought success and security. Weakness and foolish prating about
+righteousness and virtue were never worth a dollar.
+
+That was it! If you were mighty and clever, you stayed on top. If you
+were sentimental and looking after other people's interests, you went
+down. You had no time to bother about the safety and happiness of others.
+Look out for yourself. Never relent in the fierce battle against the odds
+of life. That was the only way to conquer and avoid catastrophe.
+
+He was sure of it when he thought about himself. He had a brilliant
+brain. It was not particularly egotistic for him to think that. It was
+merely a fact. But he had not used it relentlessly and incessantly.
+He had relaxed his hold too often when seeking pleasure. Although he had
+done things which had been applauded by his friends, he had nothing much
+to show in the way of lasting results.
+
+That was why he was here now, with scarcely enough resources to pay the
+rent of his bungalow and the expenses of living. A little dabbling in
+real estate, some third-rate work for the magazines, a passing notoriety
+as a guesser of crime riddles--it was not a record that promised a bright
+future.
+
+He sighed. Well, that was the way of life. He might yet accomplish big
+things although he was under a terrific handicap--and he might not. He
+would try, and see.
+
+His future was much like the probable outcome of this murder. How
+would the circumstances shape themselves? What would be the result of
+circumstantial evidence?
+
+It was all a gamble. Some murderers were lucky and got away. And some
+innocent men were not lucky. These were like the blundering, illiterate
+negro Perry. There was an even chance that the guilty man would be
+caught--and there was an even chance that an innocent man would hang.
+Life was like that!
+
+He caressed with his forefinger his protruding lip. He wouldn't say the
+negro was guilty. In spite of the evidence of the buttons, he would
+advance no such theory yet. And as to Morley--nobody could think that
+a man with such a weak face would have the nerve to do murder. He knew
+this. There must be somebody else. It might be that the sister, Maria
+Fulton, in an excess of rage--But why reason about that before he had
+talked to her?
+
+It was up to him to fasten the guilt on the guilty man--or woman. That
+was what was expected of him. And it was a task which----
+
+He turned toward the table and began methodically to paste into their
+proper places the clippings he had cut from the newspapers concerning
+other "big" murder cases. He would study them later.
+
+He looked up and saw a very fat man standing just outside the door.
+
+"Hello, Overton," he said, without cordiality, and joined him on the
+porch.
+
+"I picked out an interesting time to visit you," observed the fat man,
+still puffing from the exertion of climbing the Manniston Road hill;
+"what with murder and----"
+
+"And I'm going to be frank with you," Bristow put in. "I'm helping the
+police a little, and I haven't the time to gossip now. I know you'll
+understand----"
+
+"Surely, surely!" said Overton. "I'll come some other time. This sort
+of stuff's right in your line. You used to be an authority on it in
+Cincinnati, I remember."
+
+He said good-bye and lumbered awkwardly down the steps. He and Bristow
+had been good friends in Cincinnati, and he seemed now not at all
+offended by the summary dismissal.
+
+The door leading from the kitchen to the dining room opened. Mattie had
+returned. Bristow reentered the house.
+
+"Well?" he said in the low, kindly tone he used in speaking to her.
+
+"I foun' Lucy Thomas, Mistuh Bristow," she said, breathless and
+indignant. "She is sho' one sorry nigger. She wuz drunk--layin' out in de
+parluh uv dat little house uv her'n. Dead drunk."
+
+"Did you wake her up, Mattie?"
+
+"Yas, suh; but she ain' fit to come do no wuk. Dis ole rotten blockade
+whisky dese niggers drink jes' knocked her out--knocked her out fuh
+fair."
+
+"Did she say when she got drunk?"
+
+"Las' night, suh, late, wid dat Perry. You know, Mistuh Bristow; he been
+doin' some wuk fuh you."
+
+"Was Perry drunk last night? Did she tell you?"
+
+"He wuz a little lit up, she says, but he warn't drunk. She didn't have
+no idea whar he wuz jes' now."
+
+Bristow made no comment on this, and Mattie, turning slowly away from
+him, began to mumble something.
+
+"What's that, Mattie?" he asked, only half curious.
+
+"I wuz jes' sayin', Mistuh Bristow, it 'pears to me marveelyus how some
+uv dese niggers behave. Dey don' look arter de white folks dey wuk fuh.
+Seems to me marveelyus how a lot uv dem keeps out uv jail."
+
+He was curious enough now.
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked sharply. "What are you talking about?"
+
+"It's jes' dis, suh: when I gits ovuh to Lucy's house, de fus' thing I
+sees is a key layin' on de flo'. When I ast her 'bout it, she says it
+mus' be de key to Number Five--she mus' uv drapped it."
+
+"I see," said Bristow thoughtfully. "Yes, you're right, Mattie. There are
+a lot of careless people in the world."
+
+When she had gone back to the kitchen, the full force of what she had
+said struck him. How simple it would have been for Perry to have taken
+the key from the drunken Lucy and gone to No. 5! After the commission of
+the crime, what would have been easier than for him to throw the key on
+the floor in Lucy's house, thus apparently proving that he had had no way
+of gaining entrance to the bungalow?
+
+"I didn't foresee this," he meditated. "There's only one thing more
+needed to hang that darky. That is the discovery that he has in his
+possession, or has hidden, the jewelry."
+
+He seemed suddenly reminded of something else by this thought. He went to
+the telephone and called up the Brevord Hotel.
+
+"A Mr. Morley, Mr. Henry Morley, registered there last night, didn't he?"
+he inquired of the clerk.
+
+"Yes," the clerk replied.
+
+"I wonder," continued Bristow suavely, "if you'd mind looking at the
+register and telling me exactly at what time he did register. This is
+Chief Greenleaf's office talking."
+
+"I see. Yes, sir; very glad to. Just hold the wire a moment while I
+look."
+
+Bristow waited. The Brevord was scarcely four minutes' walk from the
+railroad station. Morley, having missed the midnight train by two
+minutes, should have registered at the hotel certainly not later than ten
+minutes past midnight.
+
+"I have it," came the clerk's voice. "Mr. Henry Morley, of Washington, D.
+C., registered here at five minutes past two this morning."
+
+Bristow was astonished, but his voice was uncoloured by surprise when he
+inquired:
+
+"Are you sure of that?"
+
+"Quite," said the clerk laconically. "We always put down opposite each
+guest's name the time of arrival and registering."
+
+"Thanks ever so much." Bristow hung up the receiver slowly.
+
+It was now after one o'clock, and, following the routine prescribed by
+his doctor, he made his way to the sleeping porch to lie down for half an
+hour before dinner, his midday meal.
+
+"From midnight until two o'clock this morning," he reflected, revolving a
+dozen different facts in his mind. "Mr. Morley failed to mention how he
+amused himself during all that time. If he's not a criminal, he's
+criminally stupid."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE HUSBAND'S STORY
+
+
+Mr. Bristow, however, was not allowed to rest half an hour. Instead, he
+was called upon to consider a phase of the Withers murder more amazing
+than any of those so far uncovered. Barely ten minutes after his
+conversation with the clerk of the Brevord, Mattie announced that two
+gentlemen were waiting to see him, one of them being the chief of police.
+
+When Bristow stepped into the living room, Greenleaf introduced the
+stranger. He was Mr. Withers--Mr. George S. Withers, husband of the
+murdered woman. He was of the extreme brunette type, his hair
+blue-black, his black eyes keen and piercing and always on the move.
+Bristow got the impression in looking at him that all his features,
+the aquiline nose, the firm, compressed mouth, the large ears, were
+remarkably sharp-cut.
+
+The man's excitement was almost beyond his control. He apparently made no
+attempt to hide the fact that his hands trembled like leaves in the wind
+and that, every now and then, his legs quivered perceptibly. As soon as
+he had shaken hands, he sank into a chair.
+
+"Mr. Withers," the chief explained, "caught me at Number Five before I
+had started down town. I have explained how you are helping me in
+this--er distressing matter. So we came up here."
+
+"I see," said Bristow, betraying no surprise that Withers had appeared so
+suddenly.
+
+In fact, he had not thought of the husband previously, except to
+calculate that, in answer to the telegram Dr. Braley had undoubtedly
+sent, he could not reach Furmville from Atlanta before far into the
+night.
+
+"He only heard of the tragedy half an hour ago," Greenleaf added.
+
+"I didn't know you were in town or even expected," Bristow said casually.
+"I thought you were in Atlanta."
+
+"I--I wasn't expected." Withers hurried his words.
+
+"You mean nobody expected you?"
+
+"That's it, I wasn't expected. But I've been in--in town here since
+yesterday morning."
+
+"And Mrs. Withers didn't know of it?"
+
+"Nobody knew of it. I didn't want anybody to know of it."
+
+Bristow purposely remained silent, awaiting some explanation. He looked
+down, studying the pattern of the scratches he made by rubbing his right
+shoe against the side of the built-up sole, two inches thick, of his left
+shoe. The shortness of his crippled leg made this heavy sole necessary;
+and the awkwardness of it worried him. He seemed always conscious of it.
+
+Greenleaf, taking his cue from Bristow, said nothing.
+
+"I came in without notifying anybody," Withers felt himself obliged to
+continue, "and I registered under an assumed name."
+
+"Where?" the lame man asked swiftly.
+
+"At the Brevord."
+
+"What name--under what name?"
+
+"Waring, Charles B. Waring."
+
+"And you've been in Furmville since yesterday morning? Got here on the
+eight o'clock train yesterday morning?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Bristow gave him the benefit of another long pause and studied him more
+closely. He saw that this bereaved husband was of the high-strung,
+Southern-gentleman type, hot-tempered, impulsive, one of those apt to
+believe that "shooting" is the remedy for one's personal ills or
+injuries. The lines of his mouth betrayed selfishness and peevishness.
+
+The interrogator broke the silence at last:
+
+"Of course, Mr. Withers, there's some good explanation
+for your secret trip to Furmville?"
+
+"Well--er--yes."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+Withers hesitated.
+
+"I--I don't know that I care to say now--to discuss it yet."
+
+Bristow shot Greenleaf a prompting glance.
+
+"You see, it's this way," the chief acted on the silent suggestion; "I'm
+in charge of this matter, the capture of the murderer, and Mr. Bristow is
+helping me. In fact, he's the man in command. His abilities fit him for
+the work. If the man who killed your wife is caught, it will be through
+the work of Mr. Bristow. I'm confident of that. Moreover, every minute we
+lose now may be disastrous to us. Consequently, we want to hear your
+story. You appreciate our position, I know."
+
+Withers licked his dry lips with the tip of his dry tongue.
+
+"How about the newspapers?" he asked.
+
+"You'll be talking only for our information," cut in Bristow crisply. "We
+won't give it to the papers. We want to use it for our own benefit."
+
+"Ah, I see. Well, then----"
+
+Withers got up and paced the length of the floor several times in silence
+while they watched him. He gave the impression of framing up in advance
+in his mind what he would say. He seemed to want to talk without talking
+too much--to tell a part of a story, not all.
+
+"I tell you, gentlemen," he said, going back to his chair, his voice
+trembling, "this is a hard thing to get to. I mean I don't like to say
+what I must say. But I see there's no way out but this. The truth of the
+matter is, I came up here to satisfy myself as to what my wife was doing
+in regard to a certain matter."
+
+"You mean you were suspicious of her--jealous of her?" Bristow
+interpolated.
+
+"No, not that," returned the husband.
+
+"He's lying!" was the thought of both Greenleaf and Bristow.
+
+"No. Let me make that very clear. I never doubted her in that way."
+
+"Well, how did you doubt her?"
+
+Withers winced.
+
+"I don't mean I doubted her at all. I mean I thought she was being
+imposed upon financially. In fact, I was sure of it. I'm sure of it now."
+
+"You mean blackmail?" Bristow narrowed down the inquiry.
+
+"Just that. And I'll tell you about it." He rasped his dry lips again.
+"This sort of thing, this blackmail, had happened to her twice before
+this. Once it was when she was at Atlantic City for a month with her
+sister, Miss Maria Fulton.
+
+"That was a year after our marriage. Then, two years later--just about a
+year ago now--when she was in Washington visiting her father and sister.
+Both those times things happened as they had begun to happen here, in
+fact as they've been happening here for the past two months."
+
+"Well," Bristow urged him on, "what happened?"
+
+"She got away with too much money, more money than she could possibly
+have used for herself in any legitimate way. First, she got her father to
+give her all she could get out of him. Her second step would be to write
+to me for all I could spare, making flimsy excuses for her need of it.
+
+"Her third resource was to pawn all her jewels. She pawned them on these
+first two occasions I've described. I say she pawned them, but I never
+had definite proof of it. However, I was sure of it. I don't know that
+she had come to this in Furmville. If she hadn't she would have."
+
+"What were Mrs. Withers' jewels worth?"
+
+"Originally, I should say, they cost about fifteen thousand dollars. She
+had no difficulty, I suppose, in raising six or seven thousand dollars on
+them--even more than that."
+
+"They were worth so much as all that?"
+
+"Yes. Her father had given her most of them before his business failure.
+He failed last fall, I forgot to mention."
+
+"Now," Bristow said persuasively, "about this blackmailing proposition.
+What was--what is your idea about that?"
+
+Withers produced and lit a cigarette, handling it with quivering fingers.
+
+"Somebody, some man, had a hold of some sort on her. Whenever he needed
+money, had to have money, he got it from her. That is, he did this
+whenever he could find her away from home. So far as I know, he never
+tried to operate in Atlanta."
+
+"What do you think this hold was?"
+
+"Well," Withers began, and paused.
+
+"Your theories are perfectly safe with us," Bristow reassured him.
+
+"I thought, naturally, that it had something to do with her life previous
+to the time I met her."
+
+"How?"
+
+"I didn't know. That's what worried me." All of a sudden, his hearers got
+a clear idea of what the man had suffered. It was plainly to be detected
+in his voice. "It might have been a harmless love affair, a flirtation,
+with letters involved, letters which she thought would distress me if I
+ever saw them."
+
+"Nothing more than that?"
+
+"I never thought she had been guilty of anything--well, immoral,
+heinous."
+
+"You say," Bristow changed the course of questioning, "she pawned her
+jewels twice. How did she do that? Where did she get the money to redeem
+them after the first pawning?"
+
+"I don't know. I never could find out."
+
+"You had no six or seven thousand dollars to give her for that purpose,
+as I understand it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Where did she get it, then?" Bristow's questions, despite their
+directness, were free from offense.
+
+"I--I thought," Withers began again and paused. "I thought that, perhaps,
+her father helped her out, got the jewels out of pawn both times for
+her."
+
+"Did you ever ask him?"
+
+"Yes; and he denied having done so. But, you see, my theory is borne out.
+Before, when she pawned them, her father was wealthy; and she was his
+favourite child. She knew he would help her. But now his money is gone.
+He's failed. Consequently, she has not pawned them this time. She knew
+there would be no chance to redeem them."
+
+Bristow leaned forward in his chair.
+
+"Mr. Withers," he asked, "as a matter of fact, did you ever know that
+your wife had pawned her jewels?"
+
+"Well," he said, as if making an admission, "she would never confess it
+to me. I assumed it from the fact that on both occasions the jewels were
+missing for a good while. They were certainly not in her possession. She
+couldn't produce them when called upon to do so."
+
+"I see. Now, Mr. Withers, what did you do yesterday, all day yesterday,
+after reaching here?"
+
+"I went to the Brevord and registered under the name of Waring. After I
+had had breakfast, I went straight to Abrahamson's pawnshop. It's the
+only pawnshop in town. I told him I was looking for some stolen jewelry
+and I expected that an attempt might be made to pawn it with him. He
+agreed to let me wait there, well concealed by the heavy hangings at the
+back of his shop. I spent the day there except for a few minutes in the
+afternoon when I went out for a quick lunch."
+
+"Yes? Did you find out anything?"
+
+Once more Withers found it hard to speak.
+
+"Yes"; he said finally. "A man came in and pawned one of my wife's rings.
+It had a setting of three diamonds. It was worth about seven hundred and
+fifty dollars, I should say. Abrahamson let him have only a hundred on
+it."
+
+"Why only a hundred?"
+
+"I had asked him to do that, so as to prove that the man was a thief--you
+know, willing to take anything offered to him."
+
+"And he did take the hundred?"
+
+"He did."
+
+"What happened after that?"
+
+"I followed him from the shop--for half a block. When he had gone that
+distance, I lost him. He stepped into a store, and I waited for him to
+come out. He never did. It was the old dodge. The store extended the
+width of a block. He made his escape through the other entrance."
+
+Greenleaf was more excited even than Withers.
+
+"This man," the chief put in; "what did he look like?"
+
+"He was of average weight, medium height. He had a gold tooth, the upper
+left bicuspid gold. His nose was aquiline. He wore a long, dark gray
+raincoat, and he had a cap with its long visor pulled well over his face.
+Then, too, he wore a beard, chestnut-brown in colour. That's about the
+best description I can give you of him. You see, this happened late in
+the afternoon."
+
+"All right," Bristow kept to the main thread of the story. "Now, about
+last night. What then?"
+
+Withers threw away his cigarette and sighed.
+
+"I came up here and watched Number Five. I had an idea that this fellow
+might show up."
+
+"Did he?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Where did you watch from?"
+
+"Most of the time I sat on the steps of Number Four, almost directly
+across the road from Number Five. You know how it is on this street.
+Nearly everybody is in the back of the house after dark. The invalids are
+on the sleeping porches behind the houses. Besides, it was in deep shadow
+where I was. I was not observed when my--when Mrs. Withers left the house
+with an escort, a man, early in the evening."
+
+"And you waited until she returned?"
+
+"Yes; I waited."
+
+"Very well." There was for the first time a hint of sharpness in
+Bristow's voice. "You waited. What did you see?"
+
+For the past few minutes a change had been taking place in the bearing of
+Withers. It was as if, having recovered slightly from the terrific shock
+of his wife's death, he was gradually stiffening, gaining the strength
+necessary to withstand the swift volley of Bristow's questions.
+
+The questioner, sensing this alteration in the other, made his queries
+all the quicker and more peremptory. He wanted to profit as much as
+possible from the other's lack of control.
+
+"I saw her return with her escort," Withers answered. "She shook hands
+with him and went into the house and closed the door. He got into his
+machine, turned it and went back toward town."
+
+"Was his machine noisy?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did you try to enter Number Five?"
+
+"No. I wasn't ready to disclose my presence. I wanted more time."
+
+He put his hand to his watch pocket and was surprised to find that no
+watch was there; he had been making nervous little movements like that
+throughout the interview; but he kept his keen glance on his questioner.
+
+"Then, tell us this, please," Bristow demanded, the sharpness in his tone
+pronounced: "have you and your wife been on the best of terms lately?
+And another thing: have you ever had any lasting, distressing
+disagreements with her?"
+
+The effect of this upon Withers was entirely surprising. He sprang from
+his chair, his features suddenly working with rage.
+
+"Dammit!" he exclaimed in a tense, vibrant voice, as his glance rested
+first on Bristow and then on Greenleaf. "What does all this amount to
+anyway? Here you are, asking me questions as if you thought I had killed
+my own wife! What I want is results, not a lot of hot air and bluff!"
+
+He snapped his fingers under Bristow's nose.
+
+"Why, dammit!" he shrilled. "Haven't you any idea yet where to look for
+the murderer? Are you groping around here helplessly after all this time?
+Dammit! I want a real detective on this job, and I'm going to get one."
+
+He clapped his felt hat to his head and started toward the door.
+
+"You can bet your last dollar on that! I'm going to get one, and he'll be
+here tomorrow if telegrams can bring him. I'll have Sam Braceway, the
+cleverest fellow in this business in the South, here tomorrow! I intend
+to have punishment for the devil who killed my wife. Punishment!--the
+worst kind!"
+
+His lips were trembling, and he dashed the back of his hand across his
+face, as if he feared the formation of tears in his eyes.
+
+"You two boneheads can put that in your pipes and smoke it! I mean
+business!"
+
+He slammed the door, and was gone, taking the steps to the street in two
+bounds.
+
+"By cracky!" said Greenleaf. "What do you make of that?"
+
+"Nothing," Bristow answered contemptuously; "nothing except that it may
+be well for us to find out a whole lot more about Mr. Withers and his
+peculiarities of temper and temperament."
+
+"I should say so," the chief chimed agreement.
+
+"Of course," Bristow added, "that was the easiest way for him to break
+off our inquiry. I don't think he was on the level with all that storming
+and raging. It might have been just a great big bluff--that's all. And
+yet, that Braceway he talked about is good, a wonder. He's done some
+wonderful work."
+
+"Here's one point," Greenleaf advanced: "why didn't he ask for help from
+the police yesterday afternoon when he lost track of that fellow with the
+gold tooth?"
+
+"Yes," the other returned absent-mindedly; "why didn't he?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+MORLEY IS IN A HURRY
+
+
+Bristow looked at his watch. It was nearly half-past two o'clock.
+
+"Hear anything about Perry?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," Greenleaf informed him. "My man found him. They've got him down at
+headquarters. I phoned from Number Five and got this. He'd been drinking.
+I gather that he's about half-drunk now."
+
+"Good! If he'll talk at all, it will be easier for you to get the truth
+out of him that way than if he were cold sober. Suppose you see him and
+Douglas Campbell; and later on this afternoon you and I can talk to Miss
+Fulton and her father."
+
+"Her father won't be here today. He wired that a little while ago. He'll
+get here early in the morning."
+
+"Very well. It's of no consequence just now. Come back here for me at
+four, will you?"
+
+When the chief had gone, Bristow sat down to his delayed dinner. As he
+ate, he went over the facts so far discovered, and catalogued them:
+
+Perry, the negro--incriminated, probably, by the buttons from his
+overalls jacket; by the ease with which he could have obtained from Lucy
+Thomas the kitchen key to No. 5; by the possible motive of robbery; and
+by the brutal means, choking, employed to inflict death.
+
+Morley--incriminated by his unknown whereabouts during the two hours
+following his missing the midnight train, and by the discovery of the
+ring (possibly Mrs. Withers') in his room at the Brevord.
+
+Withers--involved by the probable motive of jealousy and rage, and by his
+secret trip to Furmville.
+
+Maria Fulton--well, he would see.
+
+"Just now," he concluded in his own mind, "it looks worse for the negro
+than anybody else. There's one thing certain: the man against whom the
+most evidence rests by the time they have the inquest tomorrow will be
+the one held for the action of the grand jury. That's the thing to
+do--get the one who seems most probably guilty."
+
+He thought of Douglas Campbell and immediately dismissed him as a
+possibility in the list of probable murderers. The young real estate
+dealer had been completely exonerated by the statement of the dead
+woman's husband; that, upon bringing her back to the bungalow, he had at
+once said good night to her and gone home.
+
+Nor did he puzzle his mind about the unknown individual with the gold
+tooth, he who had appeared in Abrahamson's pawnshop and a few minutes
+later miraculously disappeared. If the ring pawned had belonged to Mrs.
+Withers, why should this man return to No. 5 and murder her? If he had
+obtained nothing from her beforehand, he might have had a real motive for
+the crime. But, since he had already got the ring, it seemed folly to
+assume that he would later kill her.
+
+In spite of his growing belief that the onus of proof must fall upon the
+negro, Bristow could not keep his thoughts away from young Morley. He,
+more than any of the other suspects, had told an unsatisfactory story.
+Besides, he had a bad face.
+
+The latest addition to the Furmville plain-clothes squad remembered how
+carefully Morley's hands had been manicured. He----
+
+With a quick motion, he went to the telephone and called for Greenleaf.
+
+"Chief, are you still holding Perry?"
+
+"Sure, I'm holding him. I'll continue to hold him for some time, I'm
+thinking. His story don't suit me. He says----"
+
+"All right. Ill get that from you when I see you this afternoon. In the
+meantime, I wish you'd have his finger nails carefully cleaned. I
+want----"
+
+But the request had instantly overwhelmed Greenleaf.
+
+"What!" he yelled. "Clean his finger nails!"
+
+"Yes," Bristow continued smoothly, disregarding the other's evident
+distaste and surprise. "If I were down there, I'd do it myself. In fact,
+it would be better for you to do it. Don't leave it to some careless
+subordinate."
+
+The chief laughed his sarcasm.
+
+"You know," this still with laughter, "we Southerners are none too strong
+on acting as manicures to these coloured folks."
+
+"It's absolutely necessary," was the insistent answer. "And, when you do
+clean them, save every bit of dirt thus obtained. Now, will you do it?"
+
+"Why, yes," Greenleaf assented with reluctance. "If you say it's
+absolutely necessary, I'll do it--I'll do it myself."
+
+"Good. I'll depend on you for it. By the way, can't you have somebody,
+your man Jenkins or some one as good as he is, go out on a real hunt for
+the fellow with the gold tooth? You remember Withers' description of
+him?"
+
+"Yes. I'd thought of that."
+
+"That's good. If he can't spot him at any of the hotels, have him make
+the rounds of the boarding houses. I think you'd like to get your hands
+on a customer as slippery as Withers says that man is."
+
+"I'll send Jenkins at once," the chief took his directions in good part.
+
+"Good again. By the way, you'll be up here at four?"
+
+"No; five. Dr. Braley told me we'd have to wait until then; said we'd
+better. He wants her to get that extra hour's sleep."
+
+Bristow started to say something further, hesitated and then hung up the
+receiver with a word of assent.
+
+Mattie had come in to clear off the table.
+
+"Go down to Number Six," he told her, "and ask Mrs. Allen if she will be
+so kind as to come up here at her earliest convenience. Explain to her
+that it's against the doctor's orders for me to leave this house, and
+that the excitement of this morning has tired me out."
+
+Mrs. Allen appeared in less than a quarter of an hour. He received her in
+the living room and introduced himself, apologizing for not having been
+able to call on her. She understood perfectly, she said.
+
+She was a woman about forty years of age, her face a little thin and
+worn, a good deal of gray in her dark hair. She had been nursing her
+husband for two years, and the strain had begun to tell. Nevertheless,
+he soon saw that she was a woman of refinement, possessed of a keen
+intelligence.
+
+"I wish," he requested, after he had explained his connection with the
+murder, "you'd tell me all you know about these sisters. I gathered this
+morning that you were well acquainted with them."
+
+He had always found it easy to gain the confidence of women. They liked
+his manners, his air of deference, his manifest interest in everything
+they said.
+
+"I can't say that I've been intimate with them," Mrs. Allen explained in
+her soft, pleasing voice; "but Mrs. Withers and I knew each other pretty
+well. She came over to my house quite frequently, and I was in the habit
+of running in to see her."
+
+"Don't you know the other, Miss Fulton, equally well?"
+
+"No. You see, she was always in, or on, the bed, and she never seemed to
+want to talk. Besides, she was different from Mrs. Withers--not so bright
+and attractive, and not so neighbourly."
+
+"Mrs. Withers was always a laughing, sparkling sort of a person, wasn't
+she?"
+
+"She gave that impression to some people," Mrs. Allen answered
+thoughtfully, "but not to me. It was her nature to be free and happy.
+Most of the time she seemed that way. But there were other times when
+I could see that she had something weighing on her mind, something
+depressing her."
+
+"Ah!" Bristow said with deeper interest. "That's just what we want to
+find out about."
+
+Mrs. Allen sat silent for a moment pursing her lips.
+
+Bristow let her reflect.
+
+"I don't think," she said at last, "Mrs. Withers ever was in fear of
+anybody or any thing. She wasn't that kind."
+
+"Did she ever tell you anything to make you think that she wasn't happy?"
+
+"I was trying to recall just what it was. Once, I remember, when she was
+sitting out on the sleeping porch--she sometimes came out there to talk
+to my husband, who is always in bed--we had been discussing the care with
+which every woman had to live her life.
+
+"'Women are like politicians,' Mr. Allen said. 'They can't afford to have
+a dark spot in their past. If they do, somebody will drag it out.'
+
+"At that Mrs. Withers cried out:
+
+"'Oh! how awfully true that is! And how unfair! It never seems to matter
+with men, but with women it means heaven, or the other thing. I wish
+I knew----' She broke off with a gasp, and I saw her lip tremble.
+
+"It was funny, but at the time I thought she was referring to her sister,
+not to herself."
+
+"What made you think that?"
+
+"I don't know. I had no real reason for it. Perhaps it was just because
+unhappiness seemed so foreign to Mrs. Withers herself."
+
+"Was there anything else?"
+
+"Once, when I ran into Number Five, I found her crying. She was in the
+living room, all doubled up in a rocking chair, crying silently."
+
+"Did she say why?"
+
+"No; but, while I was trying to soothe her, she said, 'Life's so
+hard--it's so hard to straighten out a tangle when once you've made it.
+If one could just go back and do things over again!' When I asked her if
+I could help her, she said I couldn't. 'Nobody can,' she sobbed out on my
+shoulder. 'It doesn't concern me alone. I'll have to fight it out the
+best way I can.'"
+
+Bristow was greatly interested.
+
+"What did you conclude from all that, Mrs. Allen?" he asked.
+
+"My impression was very vague," Mrs. Allen returned frankly. "I don't
+think it is of much value now. I got, somehow, the idea that there was in
+her life something which she had to conceal, something which might at any
+moment be discovered. I thought she was worrying about its effect on her
+husband. Of course, though, that was just my idea."
+
+"I see. Now, just one other thing: what did you think, what do you think,
+of Miss Fulton?"
+
+"Oh, merely that she's bad-tempered and impatient, always complaining.
+She was totally without any appreciation of all that Mrs. Withers did
+for her. Nobody likes Miss Fulton particularly. I think all of us, as we
+came to know the two, were amazed that Mrs. Withers could have such a
+disagreeable sister."
+
+Mrs. Allen's recital, while interesting and valuable as to Mrs. Withers'
+acknowledgment that she felt compelled to keep secret some part of her
+life, threw no practical light on the situation.
+
+Bristow was silent, thoughtful, for a few moments.
+
+"I've never seen Miss Fulton, except for the glance I had at her this
+morning," he said. "Was it possible for anybody to mistake one for the
+other? I mean this: if a man had known that last night Miss Fulton was up
+and dressed, could it have been possible for him, in a dim light and
+under the stress of terrific agitation, to have attacked Mrs. Withers
+under the impression that he was attacking Miss Fulton?"
+
+"Oh, no!" Mrs. Allen said emphatically, and then added: "Oh, I see what
+you mean. Well, they were of about the same build, although Mrs. Withers
+wasn't so thin as Miss Fulton is. Then, their hair is different, Mrs.
+Withers' black, Miss Fulton's blond. I don't know. I should say it all
+depended on how dark it was."
+
+When Mrs. Allen had gone, Bristow took from a bookcase one of his
+scrapbooks and went to work pasting into place the clippings he had been
+reading that morning when interrupted by the cry of murder.
+
+For nine years he had been studying murder cases and the methods of
+murderers. People had laughed at his fad, but now he was more pleased
+with himself as a result of it than ever before. He was still pleasantly
+aware of the prominence he would enjoy in Furmville because of
+Greenleaf's having called on him for assistance.
+
+"Every murderer," he had said many times, "makes some mistake, big or
+little, which will lead to his destruction if the authorities have brains
+enough to find it."
+
+He thought the rule might apply too widely to this case. In fact, his own
+trouble now was that too many mistakes had been made, too many clues had
+been left lying around. In order to determine the guilty person, much
+chaff would have to be sifted from the wheat of truth.
+
+He was closing his scrapbook when the chief of police arrived a few
+minutes before five o'clock.
+
+"Henry Morley," Greenleaf announced at once, "is a receiving teller in a
+bank in Washington--the Anderson National Bank."
+
+"And receiving tellers," put in Bristow quickly, "sometimes need
+money--need it to make good other money they have 'borrowed' from the
+bank. How did you find this out?"
+
+"He told me when I met him at Number Five after leaving you this
+afternoon."
+
+"Was he still there then?"
+
+"Yes. It seems that Miss Fulton refused at first to see him. When she did
+see him, it was for only a minute or two. He was very much agitated when
+he came from her room."
+
+"There's another thing," added Bristow. "Morley has two hours of last
+night to account for. He told us he missed the midnight train and went to
+the Brevord to spend the night. As a matter of fact, he registered at the
+Brevord a little after two o'clock this morning."
+
+The chief's jaw dropped.
+
+"How do you know that?"
+
+"I called up the Brevord and got the information from the clerk."
+
+"That settles it, then," Greenleaf said, his jaw set. "That young man
+will have to remain with us for a while."
+
+"Yes; quite properly."
+
+"I guess it's time for us to move." The chief turned toward the door.
+
+"One moment," said the other. "Somehow, I have the impression that we may
+get important stuff from Maria Fulton. She may not give it to us directly
+and willingly, but we may get it all the same. And I was thinking this:
+you and I have got to keep our heads. We don't want to get rattled with
+the idea that we're up against an unsolvable mystery.
+
+"As you know, I've lived in New York and Chicago and Cincinnati. For the
+past eight or nine years I've gotten a lot of fun out of watching and
+studying these cases. And the thing I've learned above all others is that
+the best way for a criminal to escape is for the authorities to lose
+their heads and think they are up against something that's really much
+bigger than it is.
+
+"You see what I mean? What we want to do is to go ahead with our eyes
+open, knowing that at any moment we may stumble against the one act that
+will make everything clear and definite."
+
+"That's good talk, and I'll try to act on it," replied the chief, "but,
+gee whiz! I'm not used to stuff of this sort. It kinder makes me sick."
+
+They went out to the porch.
+
+"By the way," Bristow asked, "what about the two buttons we found?"
+
+"They belonged to Perry," Greenleaf answered. "There's no getting around
+that. He had the two middle buttons of his overalls jacket missing.
+What's more, one of the buttons, the one that had a little piece of the
+cloth clinging to it, fitted exactly into the hole made in the jacket
+when the button was pulled out."
+
+"Which button was that?"
+
+"The first one--the one you found in Number Five."
+
+They started down the steps.
+
+"You saw the scratches on Mrs. Withers' hand, didn't you?" said Bristow.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, if Perry did the scratching, we can prove it. Any good laboratory
+man can tell us whether the stuff that was under his nails contains
+particles of the human skin, the epidermis. If those particles are found,
+the case is settled, it seems to me."
+
+"By cracky!" exclaimed Greenleaf, his admiration of his assistant
+growing. "You've solved the problem--gone to the very bottom of it."
+
+"What did Perry have to say? What was his story?"
+
+"Oh, it amounted to nothing. Said he wasn't near Number Five; said he was
+drunk last night and thought he was at the house of this Lucy Thomas all
+the time."
+
+"Then, the proof rests upon what the laboratory analysis of the finger
+nail stuff shows. When can we get that report?"
+
+Bristow was a little surprised by the embarrassment Greenleaf showed
+before answering:
+
+"We can get it tomorrow--by wire."
+
+"Why can't we get it tonight--or tomorrow at the latest? The Davis
+laboratory here can do the work. It does laboratory work for all these
+doctors here."
+
+"It can't do any work for me," objected Greenleaf stubbornly. "Dr. Davis
+and I aren't on speaking terms, personally or politically. I'll send the
+stuff down to a laboratory at Charlotte. It will reach there tomorrow
+morning if I get it off on the midnight train. We can get the telegraphed
+report on it late tomorrow or the day after."
+
+"All right; I guess that will do," agreed Bristow.
+
+As they started up the steps to the Fulton bungalow, Morley came out to
+the porch and charged down toward them. His face was convulsed as if by
+anger or fear. He did not seem to see the two men. Bristow caught him by
+the arm and put the query:
+
+"Where are you going, Mr. Morley?"
+
+Morley shook off his hand and answered curtly:
+
+"To Washington. I've barely got time to catch my train."
+
+"Don't hurry," Bristow said with a touch of sarcasm. "You're too good at
+missing trains anyway. Besides, we want to know what you did between
+midnight and two-ten this morning, and why you failed to tell us this
+morning that you didn't register at the Brevord until after two."
+
+Morley's face went white.
+
+"There wasn't anything to that," he explained. "I didn't mean to conceal
+anything. I didn't go anywhere--anywhere specially."
+
+"Where did you go?" insisted Bristow.
+
+"I took a walk. That was all. I didn't feel like sleeping."
+
+"Did you see anybody while you were walking?"
+
+"Not that I remember. Why?"
+
+"Because, if you did, it might be advisable for you to remember. It may
+become necessary for you to prove an alibi."
+
+"Oh, that!" the young man said with a nervous laugh.
+
+"Yes. Can't you tell us where you went?"
+
+"I wandered around, up and down the down-town streets. That was all."
+
+"Well, remember," Bristow cautioned him. "If you can produce two or three
+people who saw you down there, it may help you a whole lot."
+
+"Oh, that's all right, I haven't done anything against the law. The
+idea's absurd."
+
+"Mr. Bristow's right," Greenleaf put in. "We'll have to know more about
+how you spent those two hours. Really, we will. If you try to leave town,
+you'll be arrested. My men have their orders."
+
+Greenleaf had forgotten about the ring found in the young man's hotel
+room, but Bristow hadn't.
+
+Morley went slowly down Manniston Road. There was a cold moisture upon
+his forehead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+MISS FULTON IS HYSTERICAL
+
+
+The chief and his assistant were received by Miss Kelly, the trained
+nurse. Bristow wasted no time in what he considered to be the crucial
+search for more evidence. In speaking to her he exercised all his
+persuasiveness, all the suggestion of power and authority that he could
+force into his voice and expression. And yet, he gave her, as he had
+given Mrs. Allen, the impression that he deferred to her and prized her
+opinions.
+
+"Isn't there something you can tell us?" he asked, holding her glance
+with his own.
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+She was a strong, capable-looking woman of twenty-six years or so.
+
+"Like every good citizen," he answered smoothly, "you want exactly what
+we want, a clearing up of all this muddle. I thought, perhaps, there
+might be something you'd heard or seen. Isn't there?"
+
+"No; nothing, sir," she returned, true to her professional teaching that
+a nurse is forbidden to reveal the secrets of the sickroom.
+
+"You'll be called as a witness at the inquest," he hazarded, and was
+rewarded by a look of uncertainty in her eyes. "Your duty to the law is
+above everything else," he added.
+
+"I've heard Miss Fulton say only one thing," she admitted reluctantly.
+"She's said it several times while under the influence of the sedatives
+she's had."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"Nothing that made any sense. It was, 'When he--say--I--asleep.' There
+were long pauses between each of the words. She said it four or five
+times. But she hasn't said anything since she waked up."
+
+"How long has she been awake?"
+
+"About fifteen minutes. Mr. Morley saw her five minutes ago, but he
+wasn't in there more than a minute or two."
+
+"Morley's seen her a second time!"
+
+"Yes; but each time she hasn't wanted to talk to him. The truth is, she
+drove him out of the room."
+
+"You didn't hear what they said?"
+
+Miss Kelly drew herself up indignantly.
+
+"I wasn't in the room," she said coldly. "Of course, I didn't hear."
+
+Bristow apologized for the implication that she had overheard
+intentionally.
+
+When he and Greenleaf were shown into Miss Fulton's room, he had made up
+his mind in lightning-like manner that what she had said in her delirium,
+meant: "When he (her father or the police) asks me about last night, I
+shall say I was asleep all night." It came to him like an intuition,
+without his even trying to reason it out; and he decided to act on it.
+
+They found Maria Fulton propped up against pillows in the bed. Although
+her pupils were still enlarged by the sedatives she had had, she was
+plainly labouring under the stress of great emotion.
+
+Bristow was pleased by that. It would make it easier to learn what she
+knew. It is difficult, he reflected, for a person under the partial
+effects of a drug to lie intelligently or convincingly.
+
+He and Greenleaf, taking the chairs that had been placed near the bed by
+Miss Kelly, regretted the necessity of their intrusion.
+
+"Oh, it's all right," Miss Fulton said petulantly. "I know it's
+essential. Dr. Braley told me so."
+
+Bristow studied her intently. He saw that Mrs. Allen had been right.
+Maria Fulton was a dissatisfied, peevish woman. She had the heavy,
+slightly pendent lower lip that goes with much pouting. There was the
+constant trace of a frown between her eyebrows, and in the eyes
+themselves was the look of complaint and protest which the "martyr-type"
+woman always shows.
+
+She was of the infantile, spoiled class, he decided, one who, remembering
+that her childhood tears and fits of temper had always resulted in her
+getting what she wanted, had brought the habit into her adult years. He
+noted, too, that her gorgeous ash-blond hair had been carefully "done,"
+piled in high masses above her petulant face.
+
+"There are just a few questions which we thought it imperative to ask
+you," he said, trying to convey to her his desire to be as considerate as
+possible. "We shall make them as brief as we can."
+
+Miss Fulton plucked impatiently at the coverlet, but said nothing.
+
+Bristow, acting on his belief that life with this girl must always be
+more or less stormy, took a chance.
+
+"Now," he said, fixing his keen glance upon her, "about this quarrel you
+and your sister had yesterday?"
+
+She frowned and waved her right hand in careless dismissal of the
+subject.
+
+"Oh, that," she said, "didn't amount to anything."
+
+"What was it about?"
+
+"I really don't know. You see, my sister and I didn't get along very well
+together."
+
+Bristow put out his hand, and Greenleaf handed him the ring that had been
+found in Morley's room at the Brevord.
+
+"This ring," he said; "whose is it?"
+
+She sat up straight and gasped. Her pallor grew. Even her lips went
+thoroughly white.
+
+"Where did you get that?" she asked huskily.
+
+"It doesn't matter. Whose is it?"
+
+"It--it was my sister's," she said, almost in a whisper.
+
+"Do you know who gave it to Mr. Morley?"
+
+She stared, speechless, at Bristow.
+
+"Don't you know?" he persisted.
+
+"Yes," she said with obvious effort; "I--I lent it to him."
+
+"When?"
+
+"Yest--last night."
+
+"Why?"
+
+She tried to smile, but her features were moulded more nearly to a
+grimace.
+
+"Mr. Morley and I--and I--have been engaged," she laboured to explain.
+"He said he wanted to wear it for a while just because it belonged to
+me."
+
+"But he knew it didn't belong to you, didn't he?"
+
+"I suppose," she corrected herself, "he meant he wanted to wear it
+because I had worn it."
+
+"I see," commented Bristow, and added very quickly: "How much of your
+sister's jewelry is in this house now?"
+
+Miss Fulton stared at him again, and did not answer.
+
+"Can't you tell me?" he urged. "How much?"
+
+She turned her head from him and looked out of the window.
+
+"None of it," she replied finally. "I had Miss Kelly look for it. It's
+all--gone."
+
+"Why did you have Miss Kelly look for it? What made you suspect that it
+was gone?"
+
+She turned to him and frowned more deeply, angrily.
+
+"It was, I suppose," she said shortly, "the first and most natural
+suspicion for any one to have; that, since she had been killed, she had
+been robbed. It was the only motive of which I could think."
+
+"Yes," he agreed pleasantly, handing the ring back to the chief; "I think
+you're right there."
+
+He was silent for a full minute while the girl in the bed plucked at the
+coverlet and eyed first him and then Greenleaf.
+
+"Miss Fulton," he demanded more sharply than he had yet spoken, "did you
+see or hear anything last night in connection with this tragedy, the
+death of your sister?"
+
+"No; nothing," she answered, her voice now approaching firmness. It was a
+firmness, however, that was forced.
+
+"How do you explain that?"
+
+"I went to bed before my sister returned from the dinner dance, and I
+had taken something Dr. Braley had given me that breaks up the severe
+coughing attacks to which I am subject and that also puts me to sleep."
+
+"Makes you sleep soundly?"
+
+"Very."
+
+"It was a hypodermic injection, wasn't it?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you took it--administered it to yourself?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Do you know what it was?"
+
+"Yes; morphine."
+
+"A sixteenth of a grain, wasn't it? That's what is always given to
+tuberculars to prevent violent spells of coughing, isn't it?"
+
+She hesitated, but finally assented.
+
+"But that's very little to make one sleep so soundly, that one couldn't
+hear the cries of a woman being murdered and all the noises that must
+have accompanied the attack upon her. Don't you think so?"
+
+"But, you must remember," she said tartly, "I'm not accustomed to taking
+morphine. Anyway, that's the way it affected me."
+
+"You heard absolutely nothing and saw nothing until you discovered your
+sister's body at ten o'clock this morning?"
+
+"That's true. Yes; that's true." She looked out of the window, paying him
+no more attention.
+
+Bristow, in his turn, was silent. Greenleaf took up the inquiry:
+
+"Several times today, while you were asleep or delirious, you said the
+words: 'When he--say--I--asleep,' Can you explain that for us, Miss
+Fulton?"
+
+Her pallor deepened. This time terror flourished in her eyes as she
+turned sharply toward Greenleaf.
+
+"Who says I said that?" she demanded, husky again.
+
+"Things are heard pretty easily in these bungalows," he said. "One of my
+men heard it."
+
+"Oh, I understand," she replied, a hint of craftiness creeping into her
+voice. "No; I can't explain it. One can't often explain one's ravings."
+
+"It merely suggested something that we had thought impossible," Bristow
+interjected soothingly: "that you might have wanted to deny having heard
+something which you really did hear; that you were protecting somebody."
+
+"Oh," she said angrily, "that's absurd--utterly."
+
+"Quite," lied Bristow suavely. "That was what I told Chief Greenleaf."
+Then, with sharp directness, he asked her: "Who do you think killed your
+sister?"
+
+"I don't know! Oh, I don't know!" she cried shrilly, more than ever
+suggestive of the spoiled child.
+
+"It must have been some burglar. She was very popular, everybody said.
+She had no enemies."
+
+"None at all?"
+
+"None that I know of."
+
+"But Mr. Morley didn't like her, did he?"
+
+"No," she said slowly. "He didn't like her, but you couldn't have called
+him her enemy."
+
+Bristow moved his chair toward her several inches.
+
+"Miss Fulton," he asked, "you and Mr. Morley are engaged to be married,
+aren't you?"
+
+"No!" she surprised him. "No; we're not!"
+
+He did not tell her that Morley had said they were.
+
+Greenleaf was now clearly conscious of what he had vaguely felt while
+listening to Bristow's questioning of Withers: the lame man had the
+faculty of seeming entirely inoffensive in his queries but at the same
+time putting into his voice an irritating, challenging quality which was
+bound to work on the feelings of the person to whom he talked. He had
+begun to have this effect on Miss Fulton.
+
+"I understood," he informed her, "that you were--er--quite fond of each
+other."
+
+"Not at all! Not at all!" she denied with increasing vehemence. "I'm not
+engaged to him now. Nothing could induce me to marry him!"
+
+"Mr. Morley declared this morning that you and he were to be married."
+
+She caught herself up quickly, anger evident in her eyes, and at the same
+time, also, a look of caution. Bristow decided she wanted to tell
+nothing, to give him no advantage, no actual insight into the clouded
+situation.
+
+"I see what you mean," she said. "We were engaged, but I finally decided
+that our marriage was impossible--because of this--my illness."
+
+"And you told him so?"
+
+She thought a long moment before she answered:
+
+"Yes."
+
+"When?"
+
+"Yesterday."
+
+"Then, when did you give him--let him have Mrs. Withers' ring?"
+
+She showed signs of weakening.
+
+"Yesterday," she declared. "No! Last night, I've already told you."
+
+"And why did he want the ring last night when you had broken with him
+earlier yesterday?"
+
+His subtle irritation of her by his manner and tone had unstrung her at
+last.
+
+"I don't know," she cried, hysterics in her voice. "Oh, I don't know! Why
+do you ask me all these foolish little questions?" She tore unconsciously
+at the counterpane, her fingers writhing against one another. "Please,
+please don't bother me any more! Leave me! Leave me now, won't you?"
+
+The high, shrill quality of her tone brought Miss Kelly into the room.
+
+"I think," the nurse said, "you gentlemen will have to put off further
+conversation with Miss Fulton--if you can. The doctor said she was not
+to be subjected to too much excitement."
+
+They already had risen.
+
+"We've very much obliged to you, Miss Fulton," Bristow said in his
+pseudo-pleasant way. "It may be useful to us to know about you and Mr.
+Mor----"
+
+He was interrupted by a cry from the girl. Without the slightest warning,
+she had lost the last shred of her self-control. She began to beat on the
+covering of her bed with clenched fists. He could see how her whole body
+moved and twisted.
+
+Greenleaf, startled by the girl's demeanour, moved further from her.
+Bristow stood his ground, watching her closely.
+
+She glared at him with the wild look that frequently comes to the
+hysterical or neurotic woman's eyes. She did not seem to be suffering.
+She was angry, carried away by her rage, and giving vent to it without
+any attempt at restraint!
+
+In two or three seconds she had become suggestive of an animal, her
+nostrils distended, the upper lip drawn back from her teeth. Bristow,
+going beyond surface indications, estimated her at her true worth: "Too
+much indulged; overshadowed, perhaps, by some older member of the family;
+but capable of big things, even charm. She's far from being a nonentity.
+She may help me yet."
+
+He regarded her calmly, and smiled.
+
+"Don't mention him to me again!" she screamed. "I won't have it! I won't
+have it, I tell you! I never want to see him again--never! Don't speak
+the name of Henry Morley in----"
+
+But Miss Kelly had quickly motioned them out and closed the door. Even on
+the outside, however, they could hear her shrill, whining protest against
+any mention of Morley.
+
+"Now!" said Greenleaf as they went through the living room. "What do you
+make of that?"
+
+They left the house and stood on the sidewalk outside.
+
+"Not much," Bristow replied, thinking deeply. "What with Withers throwing
+a fit, and then this girl having, or shamming, hysterics, it's
+disappointing. But here's a question: what has Morley done since last
+evening to make her hate him--at least, to make her look frightened when
+his name is mentioned to her?"
+
+"What do you think?"
+
+"I should say murder, or something just a little short of
+murder--wouldn't you?"
+
+Greenleaf looked his bewilderment.
+
+"No," he objected. "I don't believe she'd protect him if she knew he'd
+killed her sister."
+
+"Not if she knew, perhaps," Bristow pursued ruminatively. "But if she
+suspected, merely suspected?"
+
+The chief did not answer this. He was clinging now to the theory of
+Perry's guilt. It seemed to him the easiest one to prove.
+
+"By the way, Mr. Bristow," he suggested, "wouldn't it be a good idea for
+us to search the yard and garden back of this house?"
+
+"What for?"
+
+"There's always the chance that the murderer, in running away, dropped
+something, even a part of the plunder. Then, too, remember the buttons."
+
+"Yes; I see what you mean, but it's getting late now. The light's none
+too good--and I'm tired, chief, tired out. Suppose we let that go until
+tomorrow--or you do it alone."
+
+"No; I'll wait for you tomorrow. We can do it together."
+
+"Oh," Bristow asked, as if suddenly remembering an important item, "what
+kind of shoes is Perry wearing?"
+
+"An old pair of high-topped tennis shoes--black canvas."
+
+"Rubber soles?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I'm sorry," observed Bristow. "That's another complication. Morley wore
+rubbers last night. Either he or Perry might have made that footprint on
+the porch."
+
+"How about Withers?" Greenleaf advanced a new idea. "He didn't tell us
+anything he did after seeing Campbell leave here last night."
+
+"That's true. You'd better see him tonight. Ask him about that; and find
+out what time he returned to the Brevord. If you don't get it out of him
+tonight, you probably never will. By tomorrow, his detective, Braceway,
+will be on the scene, and the chances are that Withers will talk to him
+and not to us--that is, if he talks at all."
+
+"Then I'll see you in the morning?"
+
+"Yes; any time. I'll get up early. But, if you get anything out of
+Withers tonight, telephone me--or if your man Jenkins reports on his
+search for the fellow with the gold tooth."
+
+"O. K.," agreed the chief, and swung off down the hill.
+
+Bristow, whom he had left absorbed in thought, turned after a few minutes
+and went back to the door of No. 5. Miss Kelly answered his ring.
+
+"I'm sorry to disturb you," he said, his smile a compliment, "but there's
+something I'm very anxious for you to do for me. Will you clean Miss
+Fulton's finger nails as soon as you can? And I want you to keep
+everything you get as a result of that process."
+
+"Do her nails!" The nurse was amazed.
+
+"Yes; please. I'll explain later. And another thing: don't cut the
+cuticle. Don't bother with that at all. Just get what's under the nails.
+You'd better use merely an orange stick, I think. Will you do that for me
+carefully--very carefully? It's of the greatest importance."
+
+Miss Kelly finally said she would.
+
+He went back to his own porch and sat a long time watching the last,
+fading rays of the sunset.
+
+But he was not thinking about the landscape.
+
+"This man Withers," he was reflecting, "and his getting this detective,
+Braceway. Let me think. I mustn't look at these things in the light of my
+theories only. Too much theorizing is confusing.
+
+"I want to get the angle of the ordinary man in the street. How would it
+look to him? Why, this way: either Withers is on the level and wants
+to do everything possible to have the murderer caught--or he's smart
+enough to employ Braceway in the knowledge that neither Braceway nor
+anybody else can get anything from him that he doesn't want to tell--I
+wonder."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE BREATH OF SCANDAL
+
+
+A telegraph messenger laboured up to the hill on his bicycle and climbed
+the steps to the porch of No. 5, displaying in his hand several
+telegrams. Two other boys had preceded him within the last hour. Friends
+of the Fulton family, having read of the tragedy in afternoon papers
+throughout the country, were wiring their messages of sympathy.
+
+This was no little local, isolated affair, Bristow reflected. The
+prominence of the victim in Washington and in the South, together with
+the mystery surrounding the crime, made it a matter of national interest.
+If he could bring the thing to a successful issue, the capture and
+punishment of the right man, there would be fame in it for him. The
+thought stimulated him.
+
+A few minutes later Withers came up Manniston Road and went into No. 5.
+Soon after that Miss Kelly brought Bristow a little paper packet.
+
+"I'm not sure I ought to do this," she said, "but, as long as the
+authorities have ordered it, I guess I'm safe. This is what I get as a
+result of 'doing' Miss Fulton's nails."
+
+He thanked her and reassured her.
+
+Mattie appeared at the door to tell him his supper was ready. Before he
+sat down at the table, he telephoned Greenleaf.
+
+"There's something else I want you to send to Charlotte with the Perry
+package."
+
+"Same sort of thing?" inquired the chief.
+
+"Yes--Miss Fulton's."
+
+"Wow!" barked Greenleaf over the wire. "I never thought of that."
+
+"That's all right, I nearly forgot it myself. How will you send for it?"
+
+The chief thought a moment.
+
+"I'll come after it myself," he said. "I'll be up there as soon as I see
+Withers. I want to talk to you about the inquest. It will be held at
+eleven o'clock tomorrow morning."
+
+"Come ahead," Bristow invited. "You'll have to be up here in this
+neighbourhood anyway if you want to see Withers. He came up to Number
+Five just a few minutes ago. You can catch him there."
+
+After supper he went back to the front porch in time to see in the dusk
+the white uniform and cap of a trained nurse as she came down the hill.
+He surmised that she was one of the six nurses who lived in No. 7, the
+house between his and that of the murdered woman. These nurses were
+employed throughout the day at the big sanitarium located just over the
+brow of the hill at the end of Manniston Road.
+
+Perhaps, she could tell him what he wanted to know.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he called to her persuasively, "but may I trouble
+you to come up here for a moment?"
+
+She obeyed the summons with slow, hesitant steps.
+
+He pushed forward a chair for her and bowed.
+
+"Unfortunately," he apologized, "I don't know your name."
+
+She enlightened him: "Rutgers; Miss Emily Rutgers." In his turn, he told
+her briefly of his connection with the murder.
+
+"I was wondering," he began, "whether you had ever heard anything unusual
+from Number Five."
+
+Miss Rutgers, who was blond and too fat, had a heavy, peculiarly hoarse
+voice. She wanted to be certain that he had authority to "question
+people" about the case. He made that clear to her.
+
+"Well, yes," she finally said. "Mrs. Withers and Miss Fulton quarreled a
+good deal. We girls had remarked on it. And yesterday they had an awful
+row. I heard some of it because it was in the middle of the day, and I
+had run down here from the sanitarium to fix up the laundry we'd
+forgotten early in the morning."
+
+"What did you hear?"
+
+"It was something about money. I didn't really try to listen, but I
+couldn't help hearing some of it, they talked so loud."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"I got the idea that Miss Fulton wanted to borrow some money from Mrs.
+Withers for a purpose that Mrs. Withers didn't approve of. 'Well,' I
+heard Mrs. Withers say after Miss Fulton had almost screamed about it,
+'you can't have any more. I haven't got it. That's all there is to that.
+I can't let you have it when I haven't got it!'
+
+"Miss Fulton said something--I think it was about Mr. Withers or about
+asking him for the money.
+
+"'You'd better not do that,' Mrs. Withers warned her. 'I tried that once,
+and he flew into a perfect rage. He was so worked up that he looked like
+a crazy man, like a man who would do anything. He looked as if he might
+kill me, choke me to death, anything!'"
+
+"Did Miss Fulton answer that?"
+
+"If she did, I didn't hear it. I just got the impression that they were
+both angry and mixed up in a terrific quarrel."
+
+"Have you ever heard anything else like that at any other time?"
+
+"Oh, we often heard them fussing. Miss Fulton did the fussing. Mrs.
+Withers was almost always gentle and calm. One other time I did hear Mrs.
+Withers say she'd lent Miss Fulton all she could afford."
+
+"When was that?"
+
+"Some time ago--a month or six weeks ago; maybe two months."
+
+"Money, always money," the lame man said.
+
+He was silent, thoughtful, for several minutes.
+
+"I'm ever so much obliged, Miss Rutgers," he said at last. "Every bit of
+evidence we can get will help us--perhaps."
+
+Miss Rutgers had risen.
+
+"There's one other thing, Mr. Bristow," she volunteered. "There was a
+man hanging around Number Five last night; rather, it was early this
+morning."
+
+"How do you know that?" His voice was at once urgent.
+
+"Bessie--Miss Hardesty and I have our beds on the sleeping porch. Hers is
+the one nearest to Number Five. She told me about it this morning. At
+about one o'clock--or between one and two--she thought she heard a sloppy
+footstep near the sleeping porch. At that time it was raining, but
+not hard--just a fine drizzle.
+
+"She went to the wiring that walls the sleeping porch on the end toward
+Number Five, and she made out the figure of a man coming from the front
+of Number Five and going toward the back fence. He had just passed the
+sleeping porch. She turned on the little flashlight we keep out there and
+saw him."
+
+"Who was it? Could she make him out at all?"
+
+"She said it was a negro."
+
+"Did she see his face?"
+
+"Not enough to recognize him, but enough to make her sure he was a black
+man."
+
+"She didn't try to identify him?"
+
+"Well, she thought it was the darky Perry who does so much work in this
+neighbourhood. She said she thought so because the figure of the man she
+saw in the rain reminded her of Perry's general appearance."
+
+"Did she call out to him?"
+
+"No; and he didn't run. He just walked fast and was out of sight in a
+moment. When I heard of the murder early this afternoon, I was up at the
+sanitarium, and I went to the matron and told her what I've just told
+you. It was her advice that, as soon as I got off duty, I should come
+down here and telephone what I knew to the police. She didn't want me to
+do it from the sanitarium because the patients might have heard it and
+become too much excited."
+
+"I see. Where's Miss Hardesty now?"
+
+"This is her night on duty at the sanitarium."
+
+"I see. Well, she'll have to testify at the inquest tomorrow. You might
+tell her that. Never mind, though. The police will notify her."
+
+"I know she won't like that much," Miss Rutgers declared; "but, of
+course, she'll tell what she knows. How about me?"
+
+"I can't say yet, but I don't think we'll need you at the inquest. We may
+need you later."
+
+"Very well," she consented. "Let me know when the time comes. Good
+night, Mr. Bristow."
+
+He went inside and picked up a novel. He wanted to "clear his brain" for
+the talk with the chief of police.
+
+Greenleaf came in, looking downcast.
+
+"What did you get from Withers?" Bristow asked.
+
+"Nothing but a good bawling out," the chief said testily. "We won't get
+anything more from him for some time. He told me so. He said: 'You
+fellows have been carrying things with a high hand today, questioning and
+frightening everybody with your hidden threats and third degrees. Get
+out! I'll do my talking to Sam Braceway tomorrow.' But I did ask him one
+question--the thing you wanted to know. I asked him whether he had worn
+rubber shoes last night."
+
+"What did he say?" Bristow was inwardly amused by Greenleaf's
+pertinacity.
+
+"He said it was none of my business; and he flew into a rage about
+it--worse than he was in here this morning. He looked like a crazy man.
+I watched him gesticulate and get red in the face and foam and splutter.
+Why, he looked like a man who might commit murder any moment."
+
+At that, Bristow started. The chief's words were strikingly like what
+Miss Rutgers had told him she had heard Mrs. Withers say: "He looked as
+if he might kill me, choke me to death, anything!"
+
+"He's going to spend the night in Number Five," Greenleaf concluded; "he
+and Miss Fulton and the nurse, Miss Kelly."
+
+Bristow tossed his novel into a vacant chair and spread out his hands.
+
+"Well, chief," he said, "what do you make out of all this? What do you
+intend to do at the inquest tomorrow? By the way, here's something you'll
+need."
+
+He related what Miss Rutgers had told him.
+
+"I'm willing to take your advice," Greenleaf announced, "but this is my
+idea: we'll present all we have against Perry, and have him held for the
+grand jury. We've got enough to do that--the buttons evidence, his
+failure to present anything like an alibi, the mark of the rubber sole on
+the front porch, the inability of the woman, Lucy Thomas, to say whether
+or not she gave Perry the kitchen key to Number Five."
+
+"She can't remember that, can she?"
+
+"No; not even when we've got her locked up in jail."
+
+"Chief, do you think Perry killed and robbed Mrs. Withers?"
+
+"I think this," he replied: "it's an even chance he did. If he didn't,
+it's a sure thing that his being accused of it and locked up for it may
+make the real criminal more careless and give us a better chance to catch
+him."
+
+"Yes; you're right. What reports have you had on the mysterious man
+Withers says he saw, the fellow with the long-visored cap, long raincoat,
+and gold tooth?"
+
+"A little something. Jenkins has scoured the town pretty well in the time
+he had, A clerk at Maplewood Inn thinks--_thinks_--he saw such a man in
+the lobby there about three weeks ago. And one of our patrolmen, Ashurst,
+says he's pretty certain he saw him two months ago near here, in fact
+down on Freeman Avenue near where Manniston Road branches off from it. It
+was at night, nearly midnight."
+
+"Did Ashurst watch him?"
+
+"Only carelessly. Says he saw him walk on down Freeman Avenue as if he
+intended going into the town."
+
+"What did the clerk see? What did this fellow do in the Maplewood Inn
+lobby?"
+
+"Nothing--came in, bought a pack of cigarettes, and went out."
+
+"Anybody else seen him?"
+
+"Not so far as we've been able to discover."
+
+"Has he ever registered at any of the hotels here?"
+
+"Not that we can find; no, never."
+
+"Funny," ruminated Bristow, "very funny. Yes, I think you're right,
+chief. Put up the case against Perry until we can do something better
+or prove it on him absolutely. Of course, if the laboratory test shows
+that he had human flesh--a white person's flesh--under his finger nails,
+that will settle it in my mind. There couldn't be any other answer."
+
+"Will the test show whether it's a white person's skin or a nigger's?"
+
+"Of course. There's no pigment in a white person's skin."
+
+"Is that so? That's something I never knew before. Anyway, it certainly
+will nail him, won't it? But, you don't feel anyways sure Perry's the
+guilty man, do you?"
+
+"No, I can't say I do. I'll tell you what we've got to consider, and it's
+not a very pretty theory; either that Morley killed Mrs. Withers, and
+Miss Fulton knows it; or that Morley and Miss Fulton together killed her;
+or that, although Perry killed her, we, in looking for the murderer, have
+come pretty near to stumbling on some sort of a nasty family scandal,
+something in which Maria Fulton, Enid Withers and George Withers, with
+perhaps another man, all have been mixed up.
+
+"I mean a scandal ugly enough for all the rest of them to make desperate
+attempts to keep it hidden, even when Mrs. Withers is dead and gone.
+Frankly, I didn't believe Withers was in on the murder or that he
+believes Maria had anything to do with it or knows how it was done.
+
+"But Maria Fulton--that's different. How else are we to explain her
+behaviour with us when we tried to interview her, the fact of her sudden
+abhorrence for Morley, the man to whom she was engaged only yesterday?
+
+"And how else are we to explain Morley's unexplained two hours of last
+night, and his apparent terror today, and his whole connection with the
+case--the matter of the ring found in his hotel room, and all that?
+There's something fishy about this thing somehow, something fishy that
+includes Maria Fulton and Morley.
+
+"This fellow with the brown beard and the gold tooth strengthens the
+theory of some rotten scandal. He must be mixed up in it some way. I'll
+bet anything, though, that he had nothing to do with the murder. That's
+what we want to get at--this inside scandal, this something which existed
+long before the murder but yet may have led indirectly to the murder."
+
+Greenleaf sighed and passed his hand wearily across his eyes. He had had
+a hard day, the hardest day of his life.
+
+"But you think my plan for the inquest is all right?" he asked once more.
+
+"Yes; it's the best thing possible. By the way, don't have me summoned to
+testify. Leave my evidence until the trial. I don't want to wear myself
+out going down there for merely an inquest."
+
+"All right; I'll fix that. We've enough evidence without yours--enough
+for the inquest, anyway."
+
+"Thanks."
+
+Bristow looked at his watch, and Greenleaf got up to go.
+
+"I'll be up here between eight and nine tomorrow morning," he said, "if
+that suits you."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To get a good look at the grounds back of Number Five. If the murderer
+dropped anything, I want to be the man to pick it up."
+
+"Oh, I'd forgotten that," Bristow said in a tone indicating his
+hopelessness of finding anything worth while. "Yes; I'll be ready for
+you."
+
+Something else was on Greenleaf's mind.
+
+"This Braceway," he said sarcastically, "the smartest detective in the
+South. He'll be here in the morning. What will we do? Work with him?"
+
+"Sure," Bristow replied heartily, as if to fore-stall the other's dislike
+of the new-comer. "Even if he were no good, the best thing we could do
+would be to work with him. And, as he's something of a world-beater,
+we'll get the benefit of his ideas. By all means, let's all keep together
+on this thing."
+
+"All right," Greenleaf agreed, his tone a little surly. "Your appointment
+to my force is O. K. I fixed that this afternoon. Good night."
+
+"Good night--and don't forget to send that stuff off to the Charlotte
+laboratory tonight. If we can find out who scratched somebody last night,
+if we can determine who had little bits of foreign skin under the finger
+nails today, we've got the answer to this murder mystery. That's one
+thing sure."
+
+Bristow turned off the lights in the living room and went to his dressing
+room to prepare for bed on the sleeping porch.
+
+"Money," he was thinking as he undressed; "money and fifteen thousand
+dollars' worth of jewelry. Where has it all gone? That's the thing that
+will settle this case, and I think--I think I've a pretty good idea of
+what will be proved about it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+WOMEN'S NERVES
+
+
+Lucy Thomas in a cell in the Furmville jail sat on the edge of her cot
+at midnight, staring into inky darkness while she tried to remember
+the events of the night before. She was not of the slow-witted,
+stupid-looking type of negro women. The thing against which she struggled
+was not poverty of brain but the mist of forgetfulness with which the
+fumes of liquor had surrounded her.
+
+Questioned and requestioned by the police during the afternoon and early
+evening, she had been able to tell them only that she and Perry had been
+drinking together in her little two-room cabin. When he had left her,
+what he had said, whether he had returned--these points were as
+effectually covered up in her mind as if she had never had cognizance of
+them.
+
+She did remember, however, certain things which she had not imparted to
+the police. One was that at some time during the night there had been a
+struggle between herself and Perry. The other was that at some time,
+far into the night or very early in the morning, she had heard the
+clank-clank of the iron key falling on the floor of her house, a key
+which she had worn suspended on a ribbon round her neck.
+
+She rocked herself back and forth on the cot, her head throbbing, her
+mouth parched, tears in her eyes. To the white people, she thought, it
+did not matter much, but to her the fact that she and Perry had intended
+to get married was the biggest thing in her life.
+
+"I don't know; I don't know," her thoughts ran bitterly. "Ef Perry tuk
+dat key away fum me, he mus' done gawn to dat house--an' he wuz full uv
+likker. Ef he ain' done tuk dat key fum me an' den later flung it back on
+de flo' uv my house, who did do it?"
+
+She sobbed afresh.
+
+"He is one mean nigger when he gits too much likker in him. Ain' nobody
+knows dat better'n I does. An' he sayed somethin' las' night 'bout
+gittin' a whole lot uv money. He--"
+
+She moaned and flung herself backward on the cot.
+
+"Gawd have mussy! Gawd have mussy! I done remembuhed. I done remembuhed.
+He done say somethin' 'bout dat white woman's gol' an' jewelery. Gawd!
+Dat's whut he done. He done it! Dat's why he wuz fightin' me. He wuz
+tryin' to git dat kitchen key. An' he got it! He got it! Ef he done kilt
+dat woman, de white folks goin' to git him sho'ly--sho'ly. An' him an' me
+ain' nevuh gwine git married--nevuh. Dey'll kill him or dey'll sen' him
+to dat pen. Aw, my Gawd! My Gawd!"
+
+She sat up again and began to think about Mrs. Withers, how well the
+slain woman had treated her, how kindly. From that, her thoughts went to
+ghosts. She fell to trembling and moaning in an audible key. It was not
+long before a warden, awakened by her cries of terror, had to visit her
+and threaten bodily punishment if she did not keep quiet.
+
+After a while, she relapsed into her quiet sobbing.
+
+"I think maybe he done tuk dat key. I knows he done lef' me durin' de
+night, an' I b'lieve he done come back. But I ain't gwine say nothin'.
+Maybe I don' know. Maybe I is mistuk. De whole thing done got too mix' up
+fuh me. Maybe he kilt her an' maybe he ain' been nigh de place. But I
+wish I coul' know. My holy Lawd! I wish I done know all dat done happen.
+
+"Dat key fallin' on de flo'. Who done drap it dar ef Perry ain' drapped
+it? Dat's whut I'd like to know. Ef he ain' had dat key, ain' nobody
+had it."
+
+She lay down, weeping and sobbing from unhappiness and terror. Bristow
+and Greenleaf would have given much to have known her suspicions,
+suspicions which amounted to a moral certainty.
+
+On the sleeping porch of No. 5, Manniston Road, Maria Fulton lay awake a
+long time and tortured herself by reviewing again and again the thoughts
+that had crushed her during the day. Miss Kelly, on a cot at the foot of
+the girl's bed, heard her stirring restlessly but could not know in the
+darkness how her long, slender fingers tore at the bed-covering, nor how
+her face was drawn with pain.
+
+"The overturning of that chair,"--her mind whirled the events before
+her--"the sound of that whisper, that man's whisper, and the sight of
+that foot! He wore rubbers. I know he did. He always wears them when it's
+even cloudy. It was he! It was he!"
+
+Her nails dug into her palms as she fought for something like
+self-control.
+
+"If it was not he? I would never have fainted--never. That's what made me
+faint, the sickening, undeniable knowledge that that was who it was. And
+I loved him! But--but the rubber-shod foot, the size of it! Am I sure?
+Could it have been----"
+
+She groaned so that Miss Kelly lifted her head from her own pillow and
+listened intently, trying to determine whether the sufferer was asleep or
+awake.
+
+"He's not stupid," she swept on, closing mutinous lips against the
+repetition of sound. "He knew Enid could do nothing--nothing more. I
+don't understand. Oh, I don't understand! I wonder now why I said I heard
+nothing.
+
+"I wonder why I lay unconscious on the floor near the dining room door
+all those hours--until ten o'clock this morning. It was because the
+knowledge was too much for me to stand--just as it is too much now. And
+I can't share it with anybody. I'll never be able to get it off my
+conscience. If I did, they'd hang him--or the other one who----"
+
+At that thought, she screamed aloud, a wild, eerie sound that chilled the
+blood of even Miss Kelly, accustomed as she was to the cries of suffering
+and despair. The nurse was at the hysterical girl's side in a moment,
+holding her quivering body in strong, capable arms.
+
+"What was it? What was it, Miss Fulton?" she asked soothingly.
+
+Maria brushed the back of her hand across her forehead, which was beaded
+with big, cold drops of perspiration.
+
+"Nothing, Miss Kelly; nothing," she half-moaned. "A bad dream, a
+nightmare, I guess. Give me something to make me sleep."
+
+She drank eagerly from a glass the nurse put to her lips.
+
+"If I begin to talk in my sleep, Miss Kelly, call me, wake me up, will
+you?" she begged, the fright still in her voice.
+
+"Yes, I will." This reassuringly while Miss Kelly smoothed the pillows
+and readjusted the tumbled coverings.
+
+Maria grasped her arm in a grip that hurt.
+
+"But will you?" she demanded sharply. "Promise me!"
+
+"Yes; indeed, I will. I promise."
+
+Miss Kelly meant what she said. She was not anxious to be the recipient
+of the sick girl's confidences.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+EYES OF ACCUSATION
+
+
+Bristow, at his early breakfast, devoted himself, between mouthfuls, to
+the front page of _The Furmville Sentinel_. It was given up entirely to
+the Withers murder.
+
+"Murder--murder horrible and mysterious--was committed early yesterday
+morning," announced the paper in large black-face type, "when the
+beautiful and charming Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers, wife of George S.
+Withers, the well-known attorney of Atlanta, was choked to death in the
+parlour of her home at No. 5 Manniston Road. The most heinous crime that
+has ever stained the annals of Furmville," etc.
+
+The article went on to recite that Chief Greenleaf of the Furmville
+police force had been fortunate in securing the assistance of a genius in
+running down the various clues that seemed to point to the guilty party.
+Mr. Lawrence Bristow, of Cincinnati, now in town for his health, had
+worked with him all day in unearthing many circumstances "which, although
+each of them seemed trivial, led when summed up to the almost irrefutable
+conviction that the murder was done by a drunken negro, Perry Carpenter,"
+etc.
+
+In spite of this, the paper continued, the dead woman's husband, arriving
+unexpectedly on the scene, had employed by wire Samuel S. Braceway, the
+professional detective of Atlanta, who would reach Furmville early this
+morning and, probably, work with Chief Greenleaf, Mr. Bristow, and the
+plain-clothes squad in the effort to remove all doubts of the guilt of
+the accused negro.
+
+There followed a sketch of Braceway which was enough to convince the
+readers that in him Mr. Withers had called into the case the shrewdest
+man in the South, "very probably the shrewdest man in the entire
+country."
+
+"Evidently," Bristow was thinking when Greenleaf rang the door-bell,
+"while I'm a 'genius,' Braceway's the man everybody relies on when it
+comes to catching the murderer."
+
+The chief was in a hurry, and the two men, going out of Bristow's back
+door, walked down to the corner of the sleeping porch of No. 7, the
+nurses' home. The frail wire fences that had served to partition the back
+lots of Nos. 5, 7, and 9 had either fallen down or been carried away, but
+there was a tall five-board fence at the rear of the three lots. From
+this board fence, the hill sloped down toward the southeast, the
+direction in which the negro settlement containing the home of Lucy
+Thomas was located.
+
+Bristow, frankly bored by the belated search, let Greenleaf lead the way.
+
+"I went up to the sanitarium late last night," the chief told him, "and
+had a long talk with Miss Hardesty. She says the man she saw night before
+last was right here, just a few yards from this Number Seven sleeping
+porch; and, it seemed to her, he made straight for the board fence. We'll
+follow in his footsteps. That will take up to the fence in the middle of
+the rear line of Number Seven's lot."
+
+He was following this route as he talked, Bristow limping a few yards
+behind him.
+
+Greenleaf overlooked nothing. The lot had been cleared of last winter's
+leaves, and the search was comparatively simple, but, if he saw even so
+much as a small stick on either side of him, he turned it over. They were
+soon at the fence, about twenty yards from the sleeping porch.
+
+"There's not a trace--not a trace of anything, chief," said Bristow,
+leaning one elbow on the top board of the fence.
+
+Greenleaf, however, was not to be discouraged. After he had walked around
+again and again in ever-widening circles, he stopped and thought.
+
+"If that nigger was running away and trying to make good time," he
+exclaimed, suddenly inspired, "he didn't jump the fence in the middle
+there, where you are. He took a line slanting down toward that negro
+settlement. The chances are he went over the fence down at that corner."
+
+He pointed to the southeastern corner back of No. 5 and, with his eyes on
+the ground, began to work toward it.
+
+Barely a yard from the corner, he stooped down swiftly, picked up
+something and turned joyfully toward Bristow, who still leaned against
+the fence.
+
+"Look here! Look here, Mr. Bristow," he called, hurrying across to him.
+
+Bristow examined the object Greenleaf had found. It consisted of six
+links of a gold chain, three of the links very small and of plain gold,
+the other alternating three links being larger and chased with a fine,
+exquisite design of laurel leaves, the leaves so small as to be barely
+distinguishable to the naked eye.
+
+The lame man shared the chief's excitement.
+
+"By George! You've got something worth while. I should say so!"
+
+"What do you make of it?" asked Greenleaf, eager and pleased. "It must
+have belonged to Mrs. Withers, don't you think?"
+
+"There's one way to find out," Bristow answered, looking at his watch. It
+was half-past eight o'clock. "Let's go and ask Withers."
+
+They went around to the front of No. 5.
+
+"One of the end links is broken," Bristow said as they ascended the
+steps. "My guess is that this is a part of the necklace Mrs. Withers wore
+when she was killed. You remember the mark on the back of her neck. It
+might have been made by the jerk that would have been required to break
+these links."
+
+Miss Kelly, answering their ring, told them Mr. Withers had gone to the
+railroad station to meet Mr. Braceway.
+
+"Then, too," she added, "Miss Fulton's father is due on the nine o'clock
+train. Mr. Withers may stop down town to meet him."
+
+"I'd forgotten about that," said Bristow. "We'll have to ask your help."
+He handed her the fragment of chain. "Will you be so kind as to take
+that back to Miss Fulton and ask her whether she recognizes it, whether
+she can identify it?"
+
+Miss Kelly complied with the request at once.
+
+She returned in a few moments.
+
+"Miss Fulton," she reported, handing the links back to Bristow, "says
+this is a part of the chain Mrs. Withers wore round her neck night before
+last. She wore a lavalliere; it had two emeralds and eighteen rather
+small diamonds."
+
+"Good!" exclaimed Greenleaf, glancing at the lame man. "I guess that
+fixes Perry."
+
+"Undoubtedly," Bristow assented; and spoke to Miss Kelly: "I beg your
+pardon, but is Miss Fulton up this morning, or will she be up later?"
+
+"She's dressing now. She wants to be up to meet her father."
+
+"In that case, I'll wait until later. What I would like to have is a
+complete, detailed description of all of Mrs. Withers' jewelry. I wish
+you'd mention that to her, will you?"
+
+Greenleaf was anxious to return to his office.
+
+"This last piece of evidence," he said, "ought to go to the coroner's
+jury. It clinches the case against Perry. Here's the whole business in a
+nutshell: the buttons missing from his blouse, one found in Number Five,
+the other in your bungalow; Miss Hardesty's having seen him the night of
+the murder; the ease with which he undoubtedly got the kitchen key from
+Lucy Thomas; the imprint of his rubber-soled shoe on the porch; the
+finding of this piece of gold chain; and his failure to establish an
+alibi. It's more than enough to have him held for the grand jury--it's
+murder in the first degree."
+
+Bristow went back to his porch. Looking down to his left and through the
+trees, he commanded a view of Freeman Avenue.
+
+"When I see an automobile flash past that spot," he decided, "I'll hurry
+down to Number Five. I want to be there to witness the meeting between
+Miss Fulton and her father. It may be possible that, when this
+scandal--whatever it was--was about to break concerning Mrs. Withers,
+this family was lucky enough to have a negro hauled up as the murderer.
+In any event, it's up to me to keep track of the relations between
+Fulton, his daughter, Withers, and Morley. The psychology of the
+situation now is as important as any material evidence."
+
+He did not have long to wait. At a quarter past nine he caught a glimpse
+of a big car speeding out Freeman Avenue. He sprang to his feet, hurried
+down to No. 5, rang the bell, and was inside the living room by the time
+the machine had climbed up Manniston Road and deposited in front of the
+door its one passenger. He was a man of sixty-five or sixty-seven years
+of age, very white of hair, very erect of figure.
+
+Bristow did not have time or need to formulate an excuse for his presence
+before Mr. Fulton rushed up the steps to meet Maria. As she came from the
+direction of the bedrooms to greet him, her expression had in it
+reluctance, timidity even.
+
+The father and daughter met in the centre of the living room. Bristow,
+stationed near the corner by the door, could see their faces. He watched
+them with attention strained to the utmost.
+
+In the eyes of Maria there was a great fear mingled with a look of
+pleading. The old man's face was deep-lined; under his eyes were dark
+pouches; and his lips were tightly compressed, as if he sought to prevent
+his bursting into condemnation.
+
+With a little catch in her voice, Maria cried out, "Father!" and stood
+watching him.
+
+For a moment the old man's eyes were dreary with accusation. Bristow had
+never seen an emotion mirrored so clearly, so indisputably, in anybody's
+eyes. It was a speaking, thundering light, he thought.
+
+The father, without opening his mouth, plainly said to the girl:
+
+"At last, you've killed her! It's all your fault. You've killed her."
+
+Bristow read that as easily as if it had been held before him in printed
+words. So, apparently, did Miss Fulton. The pleading expression left her
+face, and, in place of it, was only a flourishing, lively fear.
+
+But Fulton put out his arms and gathered her into them, took hold of her
+mechanically, displaying neither fondness nor a desire to comfort and
+soothe.
+
+Bristow quietly left the room and returned to his porch.
+
+"Her father," he analyzed what he had seen, "blames her for the
+tragedy--possibly believes her guilty of the actual murder. Why? This is
+a new angle--brand new."
+
+He went in and called up Greenleaf, only to be told that the chief had
+left word he was to be found at the Brevord Hotel. Telephoning there, he
+got him on the wire.
+
+"Neither Withers nor Braceway came up here with old Mr. Fulton," he
+began.
+
+"I know," put in the chief. "I'm down here to meet Braceway now. He and
+Withers are in conference. Braceway doesn't want to go to the inquest.
+I'm to take him by the undertaker's to look at the body, and then he
+wants to run up to see you. Says he won't learn anything important at the
+inquest; he'd rather talk to you."
+
+"All right," returned Bristow. "That suits me perfectly. When will he be
+here?"
+
+"In half an hour, I suppose. And I'll run up as soon as the inquest is
+over."
+
+"I wonder," Bristow communed again with himself, "whether this Braceway
+is on the level, whether Withers is on the level. What's their game--to
+find the real murderer or to shut up a family scandal?"
+
+The scandal theory bothered him. He saw no way of getting at it.
+
+In less than an hour he and Braceway were shaking hands on the porch of
+No. 9. Bristow, studying him rapidly, motioned him to a chair.
+
+Here was no ordinary police-detective type. This man had neither
+square-toed shoes, nor a bull neck, nor coarseness of feature. About
+thirty-six years old, he was unusually slender, and straight as a dart,
+a peculiar and restless gracefulness characterizing all his movements. He
+seemed fairly to exude energy. He was keyed up to lightning-like motion.
+He gave the impression of having a brain that worked with the precision
+and force of some great machine, a machine that never missed fire.
+
+From the toes of his highly polished tan shoes to the sheen of his blond
+hair and the crown of his nobby straw hat, he looked like a well dressed
+and prosperous professional man. His dark gray suit with a thin thread of
+pale green in it, his silver-gray necktie, the gloves he carried in his
+left hand, every detail of his appearance marked him, first as a "snappy
+dresser," and second as a highly efficient man.
+
+While they exchanged casual greetings, Braceway lit a cigarette and spun
+the match, with a droning sound, far out from the porch. He did this, as
+he did everything else, with a "flaire," with that indefinable something
+which marks every man who has a strong personality. There was in all his
+bearing a dash, an electric emphasis.
+
+"What do you think, Mr. Bristow?" He got down to business at once. "Did
+this negro Perry kill Mrs. Withers?"
+
+Braceway blew out a big cloud of smoke and looked intently at his new
+acquaintance.
+
+"I've talked to Greenleaf," he supplemented. "I suppose he gave me all
+the facts you've collected. But Greenleaf--you know what I mean," he
+waved his cigarette hand expressively; "I wouldn't say he had
+extraordinary powers of divination. He's a good fellow, and all that,
+but--what do you think?"
+
+"On the evidence alone, so far," Bristow answered with an appreciative,
+warming smile, "I'd say Perry committed the crime."
+
+"Oh; yes, sure." He moved quickly in his chair. "On the evidence, but
+there are other things, other factors. What do you think?"
+
+"I'm afraid that's my trouble," Bristow told him. "I've been thinking so
+much that I'm somewhat muddled. But I believe there may be something more
+than a negro's greed back of this thing."
+
+"Now you're speaking mouthfuls," Braceway said, smiling brightly. "Tell
+me about it."
+
+Bristow told him--about Withers' peculiar behaviour; the whole case
+against Perry; the illusive personage with the chestnut beard and gold
+tooth; Morley's suspicious story and actions; and, lastly, Maria Fulton's
+highly puzzling narrative of what she had seen and not seen in connection
+with the murder.
+
+Braceway listened with complete absorption, in a way that showed he was
+photographing each incident and statement on his brain.
+
+"Now," he began with almost explosive suddenness, "let's get this
+straight. I want to work with you, if you'll let me." He paused long
+enough for Bristow to nod a pleased assent. "And I believe there's
+something back of this crime that nobody has yet put his finger on. Mr.
+Withers believes it. Don't make any mistake about that. Withers is as
+anxious to get the real criminal as you and I are."
+
+"Let me understand," Bristow said in his turn. "Do you propose that we
+work on the case with the supposition that Withers is in no way
+responsible for any part of the tragedy?"
+
+"Absolutely!" snapped out Braceway, thoroughly good natured despite his
+abruptness. "At least, that's my plan. I'm certain Withers had nothing to
+do with it."
+
+For the first time, something far back in Bristow's brain stirred
+uneasily, as if, miles away, somebody had sounded an alarm. Should he
+trust this man? Would Braceway try to pick up a false scent, try to throw
+the whole thing out of gear?
+
+Although he, Bristow, had expressed to Greenleaf only last night his
+confidence in Withers' innocence, would it be wise to hold to such a
+belief? The future was too uncertain, too apt to produce entirely
+unexpected things. At any rate, it would be silly to call himself
+anything of a criminologist; and yet go ahead with a blind, spoken
+conviction of the innocence of a man who unquestionably had acted in a
+way to bring suspicion upon himself.
+
+He would wait and see. He purposed to throw away no card that might later
+take a trick.
+
+"Very good," he said. "That suits me if you're satisfied. You can answer
+for him, I don't doubt."
+
+"Thoroughly so. In the first place, he and I are close personal friends;
+went to college together; were fraternity mates; had an office together
+until I quit practising law and went in for this sort of work. Then, too,
+I've turned him inside out this morning. He doesn't know a thing.
+
+"And, I might as well tell you now, he didn't hang around Manniston Road
+night before last after his wife got in. As soon as he saw this Douglas
+Campbell go home he returned to the Brevord and went to bed.
+
+"No, sirree! Here's what I work on: either Morley killed her, or the
+negro killed her, or it was done by the mysterious fellow with the gold
+tooth. How does that strike you?"
+
+"Correctly; I'm with you," agreed Bristow, still with the mental
+reservation that he would deal with Withers as he saw fit.
+
+"One thing more," added Braceway, and Bristow was surprised to see that
+he looked a trifle embarrassed; "I want you to handle all the talk that
+has to be had with Miss Maria Fulton. I'll be frank with you; I have to
+be. It's this way: I was once in love with her; in fact, engaged to marry
+her. Do you see?"
+
+"Fully."
+
+He was glad to know at the outset that Braceway was a friend of the
+family. It might be valuable later.
+
+Braceway threw away his cigarette and sighed with relief.
+
+"I'm glad you understand," he said. "Now, about Withers: things have
+begun to happen to him already--this morning. Since this has hit him, he
+doesn't know where he'll get off eventually. I'll tell you."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE $1,000 CHECK.
+
+
+A few minutes after eight o'clock that morning Mr. Illington, president
+of the Furmville National Bank, had called at the Brevord to see Mr.
+Withers, who, still holding his room there, was waiting for the delayed
+morning train.
+
+Mr. Illington was of the true banker type, fifty years old, immaculately
+dressed, thin of lip, hard of eye, slow and precise in his enunciation.
+He had, apparently, estranged himself from any deep, human feeling. The
+long handling of money had hardened him. His fingers were long and
+grasping, and his voice was quite as metallic as the clink of gold coins
+one upon the other.
+
+At Mr. Withers' invitation he took a chair in Mr. Withers' room. He
+rubbed his dry, slender hands together and cleared his throat, after
+which he spoke his little set speech of condolence.
+
+Mr. Withers, haggard from grief and lack of sleep, waved aside these
+preliminary remarks.
+
+The banker put his hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a bulky
+envelope, from which he produced a long, rectangular piece of paper.
+
+"I knew you would prefer to learn of this at first hand from the bank;
+indeed, from me, its president. Yesterday, Mr. Withers, a promissory
+note, a sixty-day note, for a thousand dollars fell due in the Furmville
+National Bank. You might like to see it. Here it is."
+
+He handed the piece of paper to Withers, who saw that the note had been
+signed by Maria Fulton and endorsed by Enid Fulton Withers. The husband
+of the dead woman was too astonished to comment.
+
+"We acted as--as leniently in the matter as we could, perhaps more
+leniently than was strictly proper in banking circles," Mr. Illington was
+pleased to explain. "I myself called up Miss Fulton on the telephone
+yesterday, but naturally she was so agitated that she seemed unable to
+give me any information as to what she intended to do regarding
+the--er--liquidation of this indebtedness."
+
+"And," concluded Withers, passing the note back to him, "since my wife
+was the endorser, it's up to me to make the note good, to pay the bank
+the thousand dollars."
+
+Mr. Illington was glad to see how thoroughly the bereaved husband
+appreciated the situation.
+
+"Quite right, entirely so," he said. "And will you?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Ahem--When?" inquired the banker, assuming an expression of casual
+interest.
+
+"I haven't that much money on deposit in Atlanta, but I can get it. I
+return to Atlanta this afternoon. I can send the money to you tomorrow.
+Will that answer?"
+
+"Oh, perfectly, perfectly," assented Mr. Illington, much reassured. "We
+are always glad, at the Furmville National, to do the reasonable and
+accommodating thing. Yes; that will be thoroughly satisfactory.--Ahem!
+I have a new note here. You might sign it? To keep things regular, in
+order."
+
+Withers signed the new note. It was for five days.
+
+Illington got to his feet with stiff dignity.
+
+"Glad to accommodate you, Mr. Withers; very glad. I wish you good
+morning," he concluded, going toward the door.
+
+"Good-bye," replied Withers absently, but looked up suddenly. "By the
+way, I might like to know something about the disposition of that
+thousand dollars. Could you tell me anything concerning it?"
+
+Mr. Illington came back to his chair and reseated himself, again
+producing the bulky envelope.
+
+"I was prepared for just such a request, a perfectly natural request," he
+answered Withers question, plainly approving of his own forehandedness.
+
+He took from the envelope and passed to Withers a canceled check.
+
+"This," he said, "gives you the information you desire. You see, I
+gathered from the newspaper reports this morning and from the gossip of
+the street yesterday afternoon that there might be more or less of--er--a
+mystery in this--ah--distressing situation. Consequently, I brought along
+this check which, curiously enough, had not been called for by the maker
+of it."
+
+Withers, disregarding the banker's remarks, was studying the check. It
+had been signed by Enid Fulton Withers, to whom the $1,000 loan had
+evidently been credited at the Furmville National. It was for $1,000, and
+it was made payable to Maria Fulton. Maria Fulton had indorsed it, and,
+below her endorsement, appeared that of Henry Morley, showing that the
+money had passed directly into the hands of Morley.
+
+"That's all I wanted to know," Withers said quietly, giving the check
+back to Illington. "I'm much obliged."
+
+This time Illington departed, taking himself off with a feeling of having
+done his duty with promptitude and according to the best business ethics.
+
+His visit had prevented Withers' meeting the train, and Fulton had gone
+directly to Manniston Road.
+
+Braceway, going to the hotel on the banker's heels, was admitted by
+Withers, who broke into a storm of futile, highly coloured profanity.
+
+"Brace," he said, "you'll get the devil who's caused all this, won't you?
+You know what my life has been! You'll get him if you have to tear up
+heaven and earth."
+
+"Sure! Sure!" Braceway declared. "Keep yourself together. Let me do the
+worrying. I'll get him if he's above the sod."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"So, you see," Braceway said, in reciting the incident to Bristow, "we're
+getting a little warm on the scent. This Morley, this wooer of Maria,
+seems to have his head within stinging range of the hornets, doesn't he?"
+
+"Undoubtedly."
+
+"What do you make of it?" pressed Braceway.
+
+Bristow thought a little while.
+
+"It might be this," he advanced: "Morley is in trouble with his bank,
+short in his accounts--probably has been for several months. Two months
+ago, sixty-one days ago, he confided to Miss Fulton that he stood in
+great danger of arrest, pointed out that he had made a mistake, asked
+assistance from her, told her a thousand dollars would arrange things.
+
+"But, instead of paying the thousand into the bank, he went to gambling
+with it in the hope of trebling or quadrupling it and--lost it. In other
+words, he's been afraid to tell his financee how much he really owed the
+bank and then played the thousand to win enough to enable him to square
+himself."
+
+"Once more," observed the Atlanta man, "you speak in mouthfuls."
+
+"Again and further--of course, all this is on the theory that Morley is a
+pusillanimous kind of man; but he would have to be just that to be taking
+money from a woman, any woman, much less the one to whom he is engaged to
+be married--again and further, when he had lost the thousand and saw ruin
+just ahead of him again, he ran down here and asked for more money.
+
+"Perhaps, Mrs. Withers, at her sister's tearful request, had previously
+raised more than a thousand for him, had added to that thousand other
+money obtained from pawning some of her jewelry; and he now insisted that
+Maria make Mrs. Withers go the limit and pawn _all_ her jewelry.
+
+"By George!" Bristow concluded. "That may explain the quarrel which Miss
+Rutgers, the trained nurse in Number Seven, heard the two sisters engaged
+in the day before the murder. Yes; it might. Evidently, Mrs. Withers
+refused to be bled further. After that, what? What would you say?"
+
+"It's plain enough," Braceway answered. "There was Morley, crazed by the
+fear of arrest and conviction for embezzlement. There was Mrs. Withers,
+still possessing and holding enough jewelry to get him out of trouble, if
+he had time to convert the jewels into cash and to get back to his bank
+with the money.
+
+"What was the result of that situation? Evidently, he never intended to
+catch that midnight train. He did what he had planned to do, came back to
+Number Five, confronted Mrs. Withers soon after her escort had left her
+at the door, demanded the jewels, was refused; and then, in a blind rage
+or a panic, killed her and stole the jewels."
+
+"There's no use blinking the fact," said Bristow in a quiet, calculating
+way, trying to keep in his mind all the other peculiar circumstances
+surrounding this crime. "From the way we've put it, the thing reads as
+plainly as a primer. Now, what are we to do? Even now, we haven't the
+proof on him--any real proof."
+
+"Suppose," said Braceway, "we let him leave Furmville, let him go back
+to Washington, with the hope that he does pawn the stuff he's stolen?"
+
+"And suppose," Bristow added, "we get a detailed description of all the
+jewelry Mrs. Withers owned, and wire that description to the police of
+the principal towns between here and Washington and between here and
+Atlanta. We'll make the request, of course, that they watch the pawnshops
+and nab anybody who shows up with any of the Withers stuff?"
+
+"That's it! That's it as sure as you're born!" Braceway struck the arm of
+his chair and catapulted himself into a standing position. "That will get
+him--provided, of course, he's desperate enough to take the chance of
+pawning any of it."
+
+"One other thing," Bristow supplemented. "You said Withers said something
+to you this morning about your knowing what his life had been. Just what
+did he mean?"
+
+Braceway reflected a moment,
+
+"There's no reason for your not knowing it," he confided. "Withers
+had rather a trying life with his wife. It was a baffling sort of a
+situation. She was in love with him. I haven't a doubt of that. And he
+was in love with her.
+
+"She was one of the most fascinating women I ever saw. They used to say
+in Atlanta that all the women liked her, and that any man who had once
+shaken hands with her and looked her in the eye was, forever after, her
+obedient servant.
+
+"But she was never entirely frank with Withers. Naturally, that at first
+made him regretful, and later it made him jealous. You know his type.
+I'm not sure that I have the whole story, but that's the foundation of
+it, and it led to bitter disagreements and fierce quarrels.
+
+"Some of their acquaintances got on to it, and couldn't understand why a
+woman like her and a good fellow like Withers couldn't hit it off. Things
+got worse and worse. I don't believe Withers minded her being up here
+with her sister. The temporary separation came, probably, as a great
+relief to both of them."
+
+"I see," Bristow said. "Naturally, when, on top of all that, the money
+began to fly and the jewels went into pawn, he came to the end of his
+rope--determined to put a stop to the thing."
+
+"Probably," said Braceway, looking at his watch. "But how about our
+little job--getting the description of the jewelry and having Greenleaf
+wire it out? I'll go down to Number Five and get it from Withers and his
+father-in-law."
+
+"You don't mind seeing Miss Fulton?" Bristow asked interestedly.
+
+"Oh, no," he answered, embarrassment again in his manner. "But I don't
+feel like cross-questioning her. You can understand that. You'll have to
+take on that end, really."
+
+Bristow thought: "He's still in love with her. I was right about her.
+There's a lot to her if she can hold a live wire like this." Aloud he
+said:
+
+"All right. You get the list. In the meantime, I'll telephone Greenleaf
+to tell Morley he can go to Washington tomorrow if he wants to--but not
+today."
+
+"Why not today?"
+
+"Because there are some things here you and I had better go over, and I
+think we'd do well to follow Morley, don't you? That is, if we want to
+get the goods on him without fail."
+
+"Now that I think of it, yes. Perhaps, both of us needn't go, but one
+will have to."
+
+He went down the steps, saying Withers had by this time arrived at No. 5
+and would be waiting there with Mr. Fulton. Both the father and the
+husband would accompany the body of Mrs. Withers to Atlanta on the four
+o'clock train that afternoon.
+
+Bristow, having caught Greenleaf by telephone at the inquest, gave him
+their decision about Morley's departure the next day, and announced that
+he and Braceway would like him to send out by wire the description of the
+Withers jewels. To both of these propositions Greenleaf agreed. Bristow
+returned to his porch.
+
+"So," he thought, "it's got to be Morley or the negro."
+
+And yet, he decided, in spite of the theorizing he and Braceway had
+indulged in, there was small chance now of fixing the crime definitely on
+Morley. He had none of the jewelry, apparently. The police had searched
+his baggage and his room at the hotel, without success. Indubitably, it
+would be more likely that a jury would convict Perry. All the direct
+evidence was against the negro.
+
+Bristow did not deceive himself. It would be a great satisfaction and a
+morsel to his vanity to prove the negro guilty. He foresaw that the
+papers sooner or later would get hold of the fact that Braceway was after
+Morley.
+
+And, although they had hinted at mystery and uncertainty this morning,
+they had printed their stories so as to show that Greenleaf, backed by
+Bristow, would try to get Perry. The duel between himself and Braceway
+was on. He remembered he had discounted at the beginning the idea of the
+negro's guilt, but that had been before the discovery of the fragment of
+the lavalliere chain.
+
+Now, he was disposed, determined even, to treat everything as if Perry
+were the guilty man. He would work with that idea always in mind. In
+the meantime he would go with Braceway as long as the Braceway theories
+seemed to have any foundation at all. He did not want to run the risk of
+being shown up as a bungler. He was anxious to be "in on" anything that
+might happen.
+
+"So," he concluded, "if Perry is finally convicted, I get the credit. If
+Morley is sent up, I'll get some of the credit for that also. I won't
+lose either way.
+
+"Now, about Withers? I've got to handle him by myself. If I were
+analyzing this case from the newspaper accounts of it, I'd say at first
+blush that either Withers did the thing or Perry did it. That's what the
+public's saying now.
+
+"But Braceway stands as a fence between Withers and me. He's a friend of
+Withers and in love with Withers' sister-in-law. And he believes Withers
+innocent. That's patent. For the present, I can't do anything in that
+direction. I've got to dig up everything possible on Morley and the
+negro--and, in spite of the check business, the chances are against the
+negro."
+
+He called to Mattie whom he heard moving about in the dining room.
+
+"Lucy Thomas," he said, "is out of jail now. I wish you'd go look for her
+right away. The inquest is over by this time, and she'll be at home by
+the time you get there. Bring her back here with you. Tell her it's by
+order of the police, and I only want to talk to her a few minutes."
+
+"Yas, suh," said Mattie.
+
+"I'm not going to hurt her, Mattie," he said. "Be sure to tell her so."
+
+"Yas, suh, Mistuh Bristow; I sho' will tell her. I 'spec' dat po' nigger
+is done had de bre'f skeered outen her already."
+
+His eye was caught by the figures of Braceway and Mr. Fulton leaving No.
+5. They turned and started up the walk toward No. 9.
+
+"Mr. Fulton," Braceway explained, after the introduction to Bristow,
+"wants to tell you something about his--about Mrs. Withers. It brings in
+further complications--hard ones for us."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE MAN WITH THE GOLD TOOTH
+
+
+Mr. Fulton's arms trembled as he put his hands on the arms of a chair and
+seated himself with the deliberateness of his years. In his face the
+lines were still deep, and once or twice his mouth twisted as if with
+actual pain, but there was in his eyes the flame of an indomitable will.
+He was by no means a crushed and weak old man. Neither the terrific blow
+of his daughter's death nor the reverses he had suffered in his business
+affairs had broken him.
+
+"What I have to say," he began, looking first at Braceway and then at
+Bristow, "is not a pleasant story, but it has to be told."
+
+His low-pitched, modulated voice was clear and without a tremor. His
+glance at the two men gave them the impression that he paid them a
+certain tribute.
+
+"Both of you," he continued, "are gentlemen. Mr. Braceway, you're a
+personal friend of my son-in-law. Mr. Bristow, I know you will respect my
+confidence, in so far as it can be respected."
+
+They both bowed assent. At the same moment the telephone rang. Bristow
+excused himself and answered it. The chief of police was on the wire.
+
+"It's all over!" his voice sounded jubilantly. "It's all over, and I want
+you to congratulate me, congratulate me and yourself. It was quick work."
+
+"What do you mean?" queried Bristow.
+
+"The inquest is over. The coroner's jury found that Mrs. Withers came to
+her death at the hands of Perry Carpenter."
+
+"And you're satisfied?"
+
+"Sure, I'm satisfied! We've found the guilty man, and he's under lock and
+key. What more do I want? I'll tell you what, I'll be up to have dinner
+with you in a little while. I invite myself," this with a chuckle. "You
+and I will have a little celebration dinner. It is a go?"
+
+"By all means. I'll be delighted to have you, and I want to hear all
+about the inquest."
+
+Bristow went back to the porch.
+
+"That," he told them, "was a message from the chief of police. He says
+the coroner's jury has held the negro, Perry Carpenter, for the crime."
+
+Mr. Fulton moved forward in his chair, his hands clutching the arms of it
+tightly.
+
+"I'll never believe it, never!" he declared, evidently indignant.
+"Nothing will ever persuade me that Enid, Mrs. Withers, met her death at
+the hands of an ordinary negro burglar."
+
+"What makes you so positive of that?" Bristow asked curiously.
+
+"Because of what has happened in the past," Fulton replied with emphasis.
+"I was about to tell you. This man none of you have been able to find,
+this man with the gold tooth, has been in Enid's life for a good many
+years. I don't understand why you haven't found him; I really don't."
+
+"We haven't had two whole days to work on this case yet," Bristow
+reminded him politely. "Many developments may arise."
+
+"I hope so; I hope so," he said sharply. "That man must be found."
+
+"One moment," Braceway put in with characteristic quickness; "how do you
+know he's been in your daughter's life, Mr. Fulton?"
+
+"That goes back to the beginning of my story." He looked out across the
+trees and roofs of the town toward the mountains.
+
+"Enid was always my favourite daughter. I suppose it's a mistake to
+distinguish between one's children, to favour one beyond the other. But
+she was just that--my favourite daughter--always. She had a dash, a
+spirit, a joyous soul. Years ago I saw that she would develop into a
+fascinating womanhood.
+
+"Nothing disturbed me until she was nineteen. Then she fell in love. It
+was while she was spending a summer at Hot Springs, Virginia. The trouble
+was not in her falling in love. It was that she never told me the name of
+the man she loved." He leaned back again and sighed. "She never did tell
+me. I never knew.
+
+"I never knew, because, when she was twenty, she came to me with the
+unexpected announcement that she was going to marry George Withers.
+I was surprised. She was not the kind to change in her likes and
+dislikes. And I knew Withers was not the man she had originally loved.
+Nevertheless, I asked her no questions, and she was married to Withers
+when she was barely twenty-one.
+
+"A year later, approximately four years ago, she and my other daughter,
+Maria, spent six weeks at Atlantic City in the early spring. It was there
+that she got into trouble. I could detect it in her letters. Some
+tremendous sorrow or difficulty had overtaken her, and she was fighting
+it alone.
+
+"Her husband was not with her. I wrote to Maria asking her to investigate
+quietly, to report to me whether there was anything I could do.
+
+"Maria's report was unsatisfactory. She knew Enid was distressed and was
+giving away or risking in some manner large amounts of money--even
+pawning her jewelry, jewelry which I had given her and which she prized
+above everything else. The whole thing was a mystery, Maria wrote. The
+very next mail I received a letter from Enid asking me to lend her two
+thousand dollars.
+
+"She made no pretence of explaining why she wanted it. She didn't have to
+explain. I was a rich man at that time, comparatively speaking, and she
+knew I would give her the money.
+
+"I mailed her a check for two thousand, but on the train which carried
+the check I sent a private detective--not to make any arrests, you
+understand, not to raise any row or start any scandal. I merely wanted to
+find out what or who troubled her. Women, you know, particularly good
+women, are prone to fall into the hands of unscrupulous people.
+
+"Four days later the detective reported to me, but it was of no special
+value. He couldn't tell me where the two thousand had gone. If Enid had
+paid it to a man or a woman, the fellow had missed seeing the
+transaction. With the description of the jewels I had given him, however,
+he made a round of the pawnshops in Atlantic City and learned that all of
+them had been pawned--for a total of seven thousand."
+
+"Pawned by whom--herself?" asked Bristow.
+
+"No. They were pawned in different shops by a man with a gold tooth and a
+thick, chestnut-brown beard."
+
+"No wonder you doubt the negro's guilt!" exclaimed Braceway.
+
+"Excuse me," put in Bristow quickly, "but did you ever mention this to
+Mr. Withers?"
+
+"Certainly, not," Fulton answered. "I never told it to a living soul. And
+as my inquiries had netted me practically nothing, I was obliged to let
+the matter drop. It was bad enough for me to have interfered with her, my
+daughter and a married woman, in the hope of helping her. Most assuredly,
+I could not have distressed her, degraded her, by telling her a detective
+had been investigating her."
+
+"And that was the end of it?" asked Braceway.
+
+"Not quite. She went back to Atlanta. Withers wanted to know where her
+jewels were. She wrote to me in an agony of fear and sorrow, asking me to
+redeem the jewels. I did it. I went to Atlantic City myself. She had sent
+me the tickets. It cost me seven thousand dollars."
+
+"That was four years ago?" Braceway continued the inquiry.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Did Miss Maria Fulton at that time know Henry Morley?"
+
+"No; I think not. I think Morley's been a friend of hers for about three
+years."
+
+The three were silent, each busy with the same thought: that Morley was
+being blamed for a series of acts at this time which duplicated what had
+happened four years ago when he was unknown to the Fulton family, with
+this distinction, that this last time murder had been added to the
+blackmail or whatever it was. And the theory of his guilt was weakened.
+
+"Mr. Withers has told me," Bristow said, "that there was a repetition of
+the pawning of the jewels in Washington about a year ago."
+
+"That's true," confirmed Fulton. "But on that occasion I knew nothing of
+what had happened until Enid came to me, again with the request that I
+redeem the jewelry. Her husband had arrived in Washington unexpectedly,
+precipitating the crisis. I gave her the money. The sum this time was
+eight thousand dollars."
+
+"And that ended it, Mr. Fulton?"
+
+The old man looked out again toward the mountains as if he sought to gain
+some of their serenity.
+
+"No. That time I asked her what troubled her. I explained that I would
+blame her for nothing, that I only wanted to help her, to give her
+comfort. But she wouldn't tell me anything. She declared that nobody
+could help her and that, anyway, there would never be a repetition of the
+extortion.
+
+"She wept bitterly--I can hear her weeping now--and she begged me to
+believe that she had been guilty of nothing--nothing criminal or immoral.
+I told her I could never believe that of her.
+
+"'It doesn't affect me alone. I'll have to fight it out the best way I
+can,' was all the explanation she could bring herself to give me. The one
+fact she revealed was that the man concerned in the Atlantic City affair
+had also been responsible for her trouble in Washington."
+
+Bristow, absorbed in every word of the story, recollected at once that
+Mrs. Allen had received the same explanation when she had tried to
+comfort Mrs. Withers.
+
+"By George!" said Braceway, his voice a little husky. "She was game all
+right--game to the finish."
+
+"I think," said Fulton, relaxing suddenly so that his whole form seemed
+to sag and grow weak, "that's all I wanted to tell you. It's all I can
+tell--all I know. I wanted to show you that this man with the gold tooth
+and the brown beard is no myth, as you seem to believe.
+
+"Make no mistake about him, gentlemen. He has ability, ability which he
+uses only for unworthy ends." The old man sucked in his lips and bit on
+them. "He's elusive, slippery, working always in the dark.
+
+"He's low, base. He wouldn't stop at murder. And I'm certain he was
+the principal figure in my daughter's death. Nothing--no power on
+earth--nobody can ever make me believe that Enid was murdered by the
+negro. It doesn't fit in with what has gone before."
+
+"If there's any way to find this man, we'll do it," Bristow assured him.
+
+Braceway sprang to his feet.
+
+"You can bet your last dollar on that, Mr. Fulton," he said heartily, "If
+he's to be found, we'll get him."
+
+The old man got to his feet. The recital of his story had weakened him.
+His legs were a little unsteady. Braceway took him by the arm, and they
+started down the steps.
+
+"Will I see you again this afternoon?" Bristow called to the Atlanta
+detective.
+
+"I rather think so," Braceway threw back over his shoulder. "As soon as
+I've had lunch I want to talk to Abrahamson. Chief Greenleaf seems to
+have neglected him."
+
+Bristow hesitated a moment, then limped down the steps.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Mr. Fulton," he said, overtaking the two, "but is
+there nothing more, no hint, no probable clue, you can give us about this
+mysterious man?"
+
+"Absolutely nothing," Fulton answered wearily. "I've told you all I
+know."
+
+"You gave him--rather, you gave your daughter for him a total of
+seventeen thousand dollars, counting the loan of two thousand and the
+cost of redeeming the jewels both times. I beg your pardon for seeming
+insistent, but is it possible that you passed over that much money
+without even asking why she had been obliged to use it? Not many people
+would credit such a thing."
+
+Fulton smiled, and for a moment his grief seemed lightened by the hint of
+happy memories.
+
+"Ah, you didn't know my daughter, sir," he said. "She was irresistible,
+not to be denied--one of the ardent flames of life. If she had asked me,
+I would have given her treble that amount--anything, anything, sir."
+
+Bristow thought of what had been said of her in Atlanta: that all women
+liked her and that any man who had shaken hands with her was her
+unquestioning servant. Surely such a woman would have been irresistible
+in her requests to her father.
+
+He ventured another line of inquiry:
+
+"When you arrived at Number Five this morning, I was in the living room,
+and I saw the meeting between you and Miss Maria Fulton. I came away as
+soon as I could, but I couldn't help noting your expression as you
+greeted her. It seemed to me that there was accusation in it."
+
+"There was," the old man assented. "Enid had written me that Maria had
+been pressing her for money, too much money. Naturally, when I heard of
+the--the tragedy, I coupled it with the old, old thing that had always
+been a burden on Enid--money. And this time I blamed Maria. Of course,
+however, that was a mistake."
+
+"I see," said Bristow.
+
+He returned to his porch and sat down. He went over all that the father
+of the dead woman had told him. So far as he could see, it had only
+served the purpose of strengthening the case against Morley. Let it be
+discovered that Maria had known Morley at the time of the Atlantic City
+affair, and the case would be fixed, irrefutable. And Braceway would
+win out.
+
+Of course, there was still one chance. There was the bare possibility
+that Morley had gone to No. 5 to murder Enid if he did not get more money
+from her, and that he had been frustrated by the fact that the negro
+Perry had forestalled him and done the murder first. Having advanced it,
+Bristow did not care to abandon the theory that Perry was the guilty man.
+
+An automobile whirled up Manniston Road and stopped in front of No. 9.
+His physician, Dr. Mowbray, sprang from the car and up the steps.
+
+"Good morning, doctor!" the patient called out cheerily.
+
+"Hello!" answered Mowbray crustily. "But what's the big idea in your
+trying to do a Sherlock Holmes in this murder case?"
+
+The doctor was overbearing and opinionated. He had many patients, who
+were in the habit of knotowing to him and obeying his instructions
+implicitly. It was something which he required.
+
+"Sit down," invited Bristow. "I'm not doing any Sherlock Holmes stuff,
+but I thought I ought to help out if I could."
+
+"Well, you can't!" snapped Mowbray, with quick, nervous gestures. "You'll
+be in your grave before you know it. You can't stand this." He shot out
+his hand and produced his watch with the celerity of a sleight-of-hand
+performer. "Let me feel your pulse."
+
+Bristow surrendered his wrist to the professional fingers.
+
+"Just what I thought--twenty beats too fast. And your respiration's a
+crime. Have you had any rest at all, today or yesterday?"
+
+"Not much, doctor."
+
+Mowbray glowered at him.
+
+"Well, you'll have to have it! You ought to be in bed this minute. If you
+don't carry out my instructions, I'll drop the case. You know that."
+
+"I'm sorry, doctor, but I can't spend my time in bed now," Bristow said
+as persuasively as he could.
+
+"I'd like to know why! Why? Why?"
+
+"I'm going to Washington tomorrow, although that's a secret. I merely
+confide it to you in a professional way, and----"
+
+"Going to Washington! Man, you're mad--mad! You'll have a hemorrhage or
+something, and die--die, I tell you!"
+
+"Nevertheless," Bristow insisted, "I must go."
+
+"About this murder?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Very well!" snorted Mowbray, rising like a jumping-jack. "Go--go to the
+North Pole if you wish. I'm through! I can't treat a man who defies my
+orders and advice. Good morning, sir."
+
+Bristow gave him no answer, and he ran down the steps and threw himself
+into his car.
+
+"Mistuh Bristow, Lucy's done come," said Mattie, at the living room door.
+
+Bristow started to leave his chair, but changed his mind.
+
+"Tell her to wait a few minutes," he said.
+
+He began to think and to determine just what he wanted to find out from
+Lucy, what she would say and what he wanted her to say. It would not do
+to question her before he felt sure of what she knew and what she must
+confess. He rocked gently in his chair, going over several times the
+evidence he desired. His face was hard-set, almost like marble, as he
+stared at the mountains. He was thinking harder at that moment than he
+had done at any time since the murder.
+
+He had it now. She had given Perry the key to the Withers kitchen--or,
+better still, Perry had taken it from her--and she remembered every
+detail of it, his departure from her house and his return with the key.
+That was what she had to confess. Inevitably, he argued, that would be
+her story, or else she would have no story at all.
+
+He thought of Braceway. He made now no secret of the fact that a struggle
+between himself and the Atlanta man was on--not openly, but thoroughly
+understood by both of them--a fight for supremacy, a contest in which he
+sought to convict Perry while Braceway worked for the conviction of
+Morley.
+
+Braceway had the added incentive of wanting to run down the man who had
+destroyed his friend's home life; and Braceway believed that Morley and
+Morley's money entanglements had, in some way, caused the tragedy.
+
+Well, he, Bristow, would see about that! He knew he had the best of the
+argument so far--and he looked forward to a double pleasure: the applause
+that would come to him as the result of Perry's conviction, and his own
+personal gratification at besting Braceway at his own game.
+
+He went into the unused bedroom and told Mattie to send Lucy Thomas to
+him there. While he waited, he closed the two windows.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+LUCY THOMAS TALKS
+
+
+Lucy came slowly into the room and stood near the door. She was of the
+peculiar-looking negress type sometimes seen in the South--light of
+complexion, with hard, porcelain-like blue eyes and kinky hair which,
+instead of being black, is brown or brownish red. After her first
+startled glance toward Bristow she stood with her head lowered and with
+an expression of sulky stubbornness.
+
+"Sit down!" he ordered after a few moments' silence, indicating a chair
+near the wall.
+
+She took her seat while he stepped to the door and closed it.
+
+"Now, Lucy," he said, pulling at his lower lip as he stood in the middle
+of the room and looked down at her, "I'm not going to hurt you, and
+there's nothing for you to be afraid of. All I want you to do is to tell
+me the truth."
+
+In spite of his reassuring words, the woman caught the full meaning of
+the goading sharpness in his voice. She immediately became more sullen.
+
+"'Deed, I ain' got nothin' to tell 'bout you white folks," she said, with
+a touch of insolence.
+
+"This isn't about white folks," he corrected her, resisting his quick
+impulse to anger. "It's about coloured folks."
+
+"Nothin' 'bout dem neithuh," she continued in the same tone. "I don' know
+nothin' 'cep'n I wuz drunk. I done tole all dat down at de p'lice
+station."
+
+"Listen to me!" he commanded, a little pale, "You know perfectly well
+what I want to find out. I want you to tell me everything you remember
+about Perry Carpenter's actions and words last Monday night--the night
+before last."
+
+She raised and lowered her eyes rapidly, the lids working like the
+shutter of a camera.
+
+"I knows what you wants, an' I knows I don' know nothin' 'tall 'bout it,"
+she objected, her sullenness a patent defiance.
+
+He stared at her for a full two minutes. She could hear the breath
+whistling between his teeth; the sound of it frightened her.
+
+"Don't lie to me!" he said, now a trifle hoarse. "It isn't necessary, and
+it doesn't do anybody any good--you or Perry either."
+
+She began to whimper.
+
+Looking at her, he was conscious of being absorbed in the attempt to keep
+his temper instead of eliciting what she had to tell. He smiled.
+
+"Stop that sniffling, and tell me what you know about Monday night! Don't
+you remember that Perry told you he was going to Mrs. Withers' house and
+steal her jewelry?"
+
+"I done tole you I don' remembuh nothin'."
+
+He took a step toward her and lifted his open hand as if to strike her in
+the face. Without waiting for the blow, she slid from the chair and fell
+sprawling to the floor, where she lay, moaning.
+
+"Get up!"
+
+She obeyed him, her arms held folded over her head as a shield against
+expected blows. She was still sullen, uncommunicative, her head down.
+
+He limped swiftly to the door, left the room and went to the front part
+of the house. He paced the length of the living room several times, his
+fists clenched, his protuberant lip grown heavier.
+
+He called to Mattie, who was in the kitchen.
+
+"I wish," he directed, "you'd go down to Sterrett's and get a dozen
+oranges."
+
+"Yes, suh. Right now, Mistuh Bristow?"
+
+"Yes; hurry. I want some orangeade."
+
+He returned to the bedroom and closed the door. Lucy was bent forward on
+the chair, moaning.
+
+"Stop that!" he said, feeling now that he had himself and her under
+control. "If you don't stop, you'll have something real to sniffle about
+before I'm through with you! Now begin. What about Perry last Monday
+night?"
+
+"Please, suh," she changed her tone, "lemme go. I ain' got nothin' to
+say. I feels like I might say somethin' dat ain' so. I'se kinder skeered
+you might make me say somethin' whut I don' mean to say."
+
+Moving deliberately, a fine, little tremor in his fingers, he took off
+his coat and vest and hung them on the back of a chair. He had just
+noticed that it was warm and close in the shut-up room. There was a
+ringing in his ears. He kept repeating to himself that, if he lost his
+temper, she would never become communicative.
+
+He began all over again, patient, persistent----
+
+When Mattie came back with the oranges, she met Lucy just outside the
+kitchen door. There were no tears in the Thomas woman's eyes, but she
+seemed greatly distressed.
+
+"Whut'd he want offen you?" Mattie asked, with the negro's usual
+curiosity.
+
+"Nothin' much," replied the other, looking blankly out across Mattie's
+shoulder. "He jes' axed me whut I knowd 'bout Perry dat night."
+
+"I tole you dar warn't nothin' to be skeered uv him foh," said Mattie.
+"Some uv you niggers ain' got no sense."
+
+"Yas; dat's so," Lucy agreed dully, and walked slowly away.
+
+She moved as if she felt that there was something frightful behind her.
+When she was half-way home, she broke into a run, and, moaning, ran the
+remainder of the distance. She threw herself on her bed and sobbed a long
+time.
+
+She had talked, and for the present she thought she felt more sorry for
+Perry than she did for herself.
+
+In the meantime, Bristow had gone into the bathroom to wash his hands.
+
+"Pah!" he exclaimed, disgusted.
+
+He dried his hands and walked, whistling, out to the living room. No
+matter how distasteful the scene with the sullen woman had been, the
+substantial fact remained that he had in his pocket an important
+document. After all, Lucy Thomas had talked--and signed.
+
+"Mattie," he called, "fix me an orangeade, please. Mr. Greenleaf's late
+for dinner, and I need a little freshening up."
+
+He went to the living room window again and gazed, with thoughtful,
+slightly sad eyes, out toward the mountains.
+
+"These policemen!" he was thinking contemptuously. "They don't know how
+to make blockheads tell what they can tell. There are ways--and ways."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE PAWN BROKER TAKES THE TRAIL
+
+
+Frank Abrahamson, pawn broker and junk dealer, responded at once to
+Braceway's warm smile. The Jew had his racial respect for keenness and
+clean-cut ability. He liked this man who, dressed like a dandy, spoke
+with the air of authority.
+
+"The fellow with the gold tooth?" he replied to Braceway's request for
+information. "Was there anything peculiar about him? Why, yes. He was
+clothed in peculiarities."
+
+The pawn broker, thin, round-shouldered, with a great hook-nose and
+cavernous, bright eyes, spoke rapidly, without an accent, punctuating his
+sentences with thrusts and dartings and waves of his two hands. His
+fifty-five years had not lessened his vitality.
+
+"You see, Mr. Braceway, we pawn brokers, we have to observe our
+customers. We become judges of human nature. At the best, we have a hard
+time making a living." Somehow, with his smile, he discounted this
+statement. "And we come to judge men as closely as we examine jewels and
+precious metals. You see?"
+
+Braceway saw. He lit a cigarette and stepped to the door to throw away
+the match. The Jew appreciated the thoughtfulness. Trash on the floor
+made the morning task of sweeping up harder.
+
+"Now," continued Abrahamson, expressing with one movement of his arm
+tolerant ridicule, "this man with the gold tooth and the brown beard--he
+thought he was disguised. By gracious! it was funny. A fellow like me
+takes one look at him and sees the disguise. The gold tooth--that was
+false, fake. When he talked to me, it was all I could do to keep from
+reaching across the counter and pushing that tooth more firmly into his
+jaw. Gold is heavy, you see. I was afraid it might drop down on my
+showcase and break some glass."
+
+Abrahamson laughed. So did Braceway.
+
+"And his beard, Mr. Braceway? That was better. To the ordinary
+observer, it might have looked natural--but not to me. Oh, yes; he was
+disguised--too much.--Besides, the other afternoon was not the first time
+I had seen him--no."
+
+"You saw him two months ago, then?"
+
+"Yes, sir--two months ago, and one month before that."
+
+"In here?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What did he want?"
+
+"Money. Money for jewelry. Oh, he had the jewelry. And I gave him the
+money--a great deal; more, perhaps, than was good for me, when you
+remember I always try to make a reasonable profit. He argued. He knew
+about values."
+
+This interested Braceway more than anything he had yet heard.
+
+"That gave you an idea," he suggested.
+
+"You are quick, Mr. Braceway. It did give me an idea. It made me think:
+well! This man, he has pawned things before, these very same things.
+He knew quite well what they should bring." Abrahamson shrugged his
+shoulders. "And he did know--and I let him have the money. That is, I
+mean, what happened the first two times. This last time, the three days
+ago, he was different, in a hurry, and he took only what I offered. He
+made no argument. I could see he was frightened. Yes--he was different
+this last time."
+
+The detective, oblivious of the other for a moment, blew a cloud of smoke
+across the counter, causing the Jew to dodge and cough.
+
+"Let me see," Braceway said. "You saw him three months ago, two months
+ago, and three days ago. Had you ever seen him before?"
+
+Abrahamson laughed, and, reaching over, slapped Braceway on the shoulder
+gently.
+
+"You are so quick, Mr. Braceway! I can't swear I had ever seen him
+before, but I think I had--not with the gold tooth and the beard, but
+with a moustache and bushy eyebrows, eyebrows too bushy."
+
+"Where? Where did you see him?"
+
+"Here, I think--but I'm not sure, you see. Sometimes I have traveled a
+little--to Atlanta, to Washington, to New York. I don't know; I can't
+tell whether I saw him in one of those places, or some other place, or
+here."
+
+Braceway urged him with his eyes.
+
+"If you only could! Mr. Abrahamson, if you could remember where you saw
+him when he wore the moustache, you would enable me to put my hands on
+him. You'd do more. You'd give me enough information to lead to the
+arrest of the murderer."
+
+Abrahamson was silent, gazing through the shop doorway. He turned to the
+detective again.
+
+"I bet you, Mr. Braceway, you will be glad to hear something. Chief
+Greenleaf was in here this morning, asking questions. But he asked so
+many that were worth nothing, so few that were good. And I forgot to tell
+him the whole story--the things of, perhaps, significance."
+
+"Tell me. Significance is what I'm after."
+
+"Well, you know Mr. Withers spent almost the whole day in here before the
+night of the murder. Once he went out. That was in the late afternoon to
+get some lunch. While he was out--understand, while he was out--in came
+the gold-tooth fellow.
+
+"It was bad luck. I kept him as long as I could, but he was hurried,
+nervous. Half an hour, forty minutes maybe, after the gold-tooth fellow
+had gone, in came Withers again, out of breath, complaining that he had
+picked the man up just outside here and followed him, only to lose him
+when the gold-tooth fellow went through Casey's store to the avenue.
+
+"I showed Withers the ring the fellow had pawned for a hundred dollars.
+
+"'Yes, yes!' he said; 'that's one of my wife's rings.'
+
+"And he was all cut up.
+
+"Now, here is what I have to tell." Abrahamson lowered his voice and,
+leaning low on his elbow, thrust his face far over the counter toward
+Braceway. "It is only an idea, but--it is an idea. I bet you I would not
+tell anybody else. Such things might get a man into trouble. But I like
+you, Mr. Braceway. I confide in you. Mr. Withers and that man with the
+beard and the gold tooth--something in the look of the eyes, something
+in the build of the shoulders--each reminded me of the other, a little.
+And they were at no time in here together. Just an idea, I told you.
+But----"
+
+He spread out his hands, straightened his back, and smiled.
+
+Braceway was, undisguisedly, amazed.
+
+"You mean Withers was the----"
+
+"S--sh--sh!" Abrahamson held up a protesting hand. "Not so loud, Mr.
+Braceway. It is just an idea for you to think over. I study faces,
+and all that sort of thing, and ideas sometimes are valuable--sometimes
+not."
+
+"By George!" Braceway put into his expression an enthusiasm he was far
+from feeling. "You've done me a service, a tremendous service, Mr.
+Abrahamson."
+
+He thought rapidly. Three months ago! Where had George Withers been then?
+Three months ago was the first of February. He started. It was then that
+Withers had gone to Savannah. At least, he had said he was going to
+Savannah. And two months ago? He was not certain, but when had George
+left Atlanta, ostensibly for Memphis?
+
+Inwardly, the detective ridiculed himself. He would have sworn to the
+innocence of Withers. In fact, he was swearing to it all over again as
+he stood there in the pawnshop. Abrahamson's "idea" was out of the
+question. People were often victims of "wild thinking" in the midst of
+the excitement caused by a murder mystery.
+
+He returned to the effort to persuade the Jew to try to remember where he
+had seen the bearded man without a beard, with only a moustache and bushy
+eyebrows.
+
+"That's the important thing," he urged. "If you can remember that, I'll
+land the murderer."
+
+"Maybe--perhaps, I can." The pawn broker hesitated, then made up his mind
+to confide to Braceway another secret. "I don't promise, but there is a
+chance. You see, Mr. Braceway, I'm a thinker." He smiled, deprecating the
+statement. "Most men do not think. But me, I think. I do this: I want to
+remember something. Good! I go back into my little room back of the shop,
+and I practise association of ideas. What does the moustache remind me
+of? What was in his voice that made me think I had seen him before? What
+do his eyes bring up in my mind?
+
+"So! I go back over the months, over the years. One idea leads to another
+connected with it. There flash into my mind links and links of thoughts
+until I have a chain leading to--where? Somewhere. It is fun--and it
+brings the results. I will do so tonight and tomorrow. I will try. I
+bet you I will be able to tell you--finally. You see?"
+
+"It's a great scheme," said Braceway, encouraging him. "It ought to work.
+Now, tell me this: how did this fellow strike you? What did you think of
+him when he was in here pawning jewels and wearing a disguise?"
+
+"I will tell you the truth. I thought at first he was like a lot of other
+sick people who come here with that disease--tuberculosis. In the
+beginning they have plenty of money. They expect to get well before the
+money gives out. But they have miscalculated. They are not yet well, and
+the money is gone.
+
+"What next? They must have more money. With this disease, the rich get
+well, the poor die. Well! I thought this fellow needed money to get
+well--that was all; and, like a lot of them, he was ashamed of being hard
+up and didn't want it known."
+
+"Tell me this: would the ordinary man in the street have noticed that the
+gold tooth was a false, clumsy affair?"
+
+"I think not. I buy all sorts of old gold and sets of false teeth. There
+is a market for them. I have studied them. That's why I saw what this
+fellow's was."
+
+"I see. Now, will you show me what he pawned two months ago, and three
+months ago?"
+
+Abrahamson consulted a big book, went to the safe at the back of the
+shop, and returned with two little packets. In the first were two
+bracelets, one studded with emeralds and diamonds, the other set with
+rubies. In the second envelope was a gold ring set with one large diamond
+surrounded by small rubies.
+
+"I allowed him six hundred dollars on the bracelets," explained
+Abrahamson; "they are handsome--exquisite; and three hundred and fifty
+on the ring."
+
+Braceway passed the stuff back to him. It was a part of the Withers
+jewelry.
+
+"You see, Mr. Braceway," added the Jew, "all this business, this murder
+and everything, will cost me money. This jewelry, it is stolen goods.
+Chief Greenleaf leaves it here for the present, as a decoy. Perhaps,
+somebody might try to reclaim it. That's what he thinks. As for me, I
+don't think so. It is a dead loss."
+
+He sighed and rearranged the articles in their envelopes.
+
+"Yes," agreed the detective; "it's hard luck. You've got every reason to
+be interested in running down the truth in this mix-up. I wish you could
+tell me where you think you saw this man--the time he had neither the
+gold tooth nor the brown beard."
+
+"Be patient, my friend--Mr. Braceway. By tomorrow I may remember. I shall
+work hard--the association of ideas! It is a great system."
+
+Braceway thanked him and was about to leave the shop. He had already
+formed a new plan. He turned back to the pawn broker.
+
+"By the way," he said, "I'm going to Washington tomorrow. If you should
+remember, if the association of ideas produces anything, I wonder if
+you'd wire me?"
+
+"Certainly. Certainly."
+
+The detective wrote on a slip of paper: S. S. Braceway, Willard Hotel. He
+handed it to Abrahamson.
+
+"Wire me that address, collect," he directed.
+
+Abrahamson promised, smiling. He was pleased with the idea of helping to
+solve the problem which convulsed Furmville.
+
+"Oh," added Braceway, "another thing. How would you describe this fellow
+in addition to the fact that he wore the beard and the gold tooth?"
+
+"Very thin lips," replied Abrahamson slowly, "and high, straight,
+aquiline nose, and blond hair, and--and, I should say, rather thin, high
+voice."
+
+"Good!" Braceway exclaimed. "Good! Mr. Abrahamson, you've just described
+the man who, I believe, committed the murder. And I know where he is."
+
+Morley had been pointed out to him in the hotel earlier in the day, and
+Abrahamson's memory sketched a fairly good likeness of the young man as
+he remembered him. Why not make certain of it at once?
+
+"You've been very obliging," he continued, "and, I suppose, that's why I
+feel I can impose on you further. I confide in you, as you did in me. I'm
+going back to the Brevord now. Could you follow me and take a look at a
+man who'll be with me there?"
+
+The Jew's eyes sparkled.
+
+"Yes, Mr. Braceway," he said and added: "It may cost me money, closing up
+the shop, you understand. But if I can help----"
+
+"Don't misunderstand me," the detective cautioned. "There's no charge of
+murder. Nothing like that. This fellow may be the gold-tooth man, and
+still not be the guilty man."
+
+"I see; I see," Abrahamson's tone was one of importance. "You go on, Mr.
+Braceway. I'll follow in three minutes."
+
+"If the man I'm with is the one who wore the disguise, if he looks more
+like it than Mr. Withers did, make no sign. If he's not the fellow
+communicate with me later--as soon as you can."
+
+Morley was the first person Braceway saw when he entered the lobby of the
+hotel. He lost no time, but crossed over to the leather settee on which
+the young man sat. Morley looked haggard and frightened, and, although he
+held a newspaper in front of him, was gazing into space.
+
+Braceway decided to "take a chance." He had a great respect for his
+intuitions. These "hunches," he had found, were sometimes of no value,
+but they had helped him often enough to make the ideas that came to him
+in this way worth trying. He introduced himself.
+
+"I was wondering," he said, sitting down beside Morley, "if you couldn't
+help me out in a little matter."
+
+Morley sighed and put down his paper before he answered:
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Something about make-ups--facial make-up."
+
+Morley looked at him and felt that the detective's eyes bored into him.
+
+"What about make-up?"
+
+"I had the idea--perhaps I got it from George Withers--that you used to
+be interested in a matter of theatricals."
+
+Morley coloured.
+
+"Yes. That is," he qualified, "I was a member of the dramatic club when
+I was in college, University of Pennsylvania. But I didn't know Withers
+knew anything about it."
+
+Braceway's demeanour now was casual. His eyes were no longer on Morley.
+He was watching Abrahamson, who was at the news-stand near the main
+entrance.
+
+"I thought George had mentioned it to me, but I may be mistaken. Did you
+ever 'make up' with a beard?"
+
+The morning papers had got hold of the suspicion of some of the
+authorities that a man wearing a brown beard and a gold tooth was wanted
+because of the murder of Mrs. Withers. Although Chief Greenleaf had tried
+to keep it quiet, it had leaked out as a result of Jenkins' search for
+traces of the man. Morley had read all this, and Braceway's question
+upset him.
+
+"No," he answered; "I never did. I played women's parts."
+
+Abrahamson was shaking his head in negation. He made it plain that he saw
+in Morley no resemblance to the man who had come disguised to the
+pawnshop.
+
+Braceway did not press Morley for further information.
+
+"Then you can't help me," he laughed lightly. "Women don't wear beards."
+
+He got up with a careless word about the hot weather and passed on to the
+clerk's desk. He was thinking: "He was lying. Any college annual prints
+the cast of the important 'show' given by the dramatic club that year.
+I'll wire Philadelphia."
+
+He found the manager of the Brevord and inquired:
+
+"How about the bellboy who was on duty all Monday night, Mr. Keene?"
+
+"He's in the house now," Keene informed him. "Roddy is his name."
+
+"Send him up to my room, will you?"
+
+Braceway stepped into the elevator. Five minutes after he had
+disappeared, Morley went into the writing room. His hand trembled a
+little as he picked up a pen. He put two or three lines on several sheets
+of paper, one after the other, and tore up all of them.
+
+The communication which he finally completed he put into an envelope and
+addressed to Braceway. It read:
+
+  "Dear Mr. Braceway: When you asked me about the make-up, I was thinking
+  of something else and was not quite clear as to what you were saying or
+  what you wanted to know. I remember now that, on one occasion, I did
+  have a part as a man who wore a beard in a play given by my college
+  dramatic club. However, I don't remember enough about it to pass as an
+  expert on such make-ups.
+
+  "Yours truly,
+
+  "Henry Morley."
+
+Going to the desk, he left the note for the detective.
+
+"I'm a fool," he reflected, as he went to the door and looked out at the
+traffic in the street. "I believe I'll get a lawyer."
+
+He considered this for a while.
+
+"Oh, what's the use? He'll ask me a lot of questions, and----"
+
+He shuddered and turned back into the lobby, hesitant and wretched.
+
+"My God!" he thought miserably. "I've got to get back to Washington! I've
+got to! After that, I can think--think!"
+
+But he believed he could not go until the chief of police gave him
+permission. If he had consulted a lawyer, he might have found out
+differently. As it was, he stayed on, thinking more and more
+disconnectedly, eating nothing, his nerves wearing to raw ends.
+
+Upstairs Braceway was strengthening the net he had already woven around
+Henry Morley.
+
+"I was right." He reviewed what he had learned from Abrahamson. "It's
+still up to Morley. That pawn broker's off, 'way off. He thinks George
+Withers resembles the man with the beard, and, although he gave me the
+description that fitted Morley exactly, he takes a look at him and denies
+emphatically that Morley resembles at all the fellow with the disguise."
+
+Abrahamson, however, was not satisfied with what he had seen. Back in
+front of his shop, he opened the door, took down the sign he had left
+hanging on the knob, "Back in ten minutes," substituted another, "Closed
+for the day," relocked the door, and started off in the direction of
+Casey's department store.
+
+He had decided to devote the whole afternoon to detective work. Of
+course, it would cost him money, having the shop closed half a day.
+"But," he consoled himself, "I'm worth seventy thousand dollars. I bet
+I am entitled to a little holiday."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+BRACEWAY SEES A LIGHT
+
+
+Braceway had discovered long ago that the man who attempts good work as a
+detective must depend almost as much on his ability to make friends as he
+does on his capacity for sifting evidence.
+
+"I'm a good worker," he was in the habit of saying, "but I'm not half as
+good working alone as I am when I have the help of all the men and women
+who are witnesses in a case or connected with it in some other way. I
+need all the cooperation I can get."
+
+This was one reason why Roddy, when he entered Braceway's room, felt sure
+immediately that he would receive only kindly treatment. He had shown
+signs of fear on entering the room, and in his extremely black face his
+singularly white eyeballs had rolled around grotesquely.
+
+But Braceway put him at ease with a smile.
+
+"What have you been trying to do, Roddy?" was his first good-humoured
+question. "Think you've got sense enough to fool all the white folks?"
+
+"Who, boss? Me, boss?" the boy returned, disavowing with a grin any
+pretense to intelligence. "Naw, suh, boss. You knows I ain' got no sense.
+I ain' nevuh tried to fool nobody."
+
+"Didn't you tell the chief of police you were awake all of Monday night
+when you were on duty in the lobby and didn't you say the only thing you
+did was to carry up Mr. Morley's bags?"
+
+"Yas, suh, boss; an' dat was de truth--nothin' but de truth, boss. Gawd
+knows----"
+
+Braceway took from his pocket a crisp, new one-dollar bill and smoothed
+it out on his knee.
+
+"Now, listen to me, Roddy," he said, this time unsmiling. "Mr. Keene has
+just told me he wouldn't fire you, even if you did go to sleep Monday
+night. There's nothing for you to be afraid of; and this dollar note is
+yours as soon as you tell me the truth, the real truth, about what you
+saw and what you missed seeing Monday night. If you don't tell me, I'll
+have you arrested."
+
+Roddy's eyes, which had shone with a rather greasy glitter at the sight
+of the money, rolled rapidly and whitely in their sockets at the mention
+of arrest.
+
+"'Deed, boss, you ain' gwine to have no cause to 'res' me, no cause
+whatsomever. You knows how 'tis, boss. Us coloured folks, we got a gif,
+jes' a natchel gif', foh nappin' an' sleepin'. Boss, dar ain' no nigger
+in dis town whut would have kep' wide awake--_wide_--all dat Monday night
+nor any yuther night."
+
+"Very well. Think now. Try to remember. Were you asleep at all before
+midnight?"
+
+"Naw, suh, boss. Naw, suh!"
+
+"Not at all?"
+
+Roddy began to wilt again.
+
+"Well, it might uv been dis way, boss, possibilly. 'Long 'bout 'leven I
+kinder remembuhs jes' a sort uv nap, mo' like a slip, boss." He coughed
+and spoke desperately: "You see, boss, when it gits a little quiet at
+night, seems to me, why, right den, ev'y nigger I knows is got a hinge in
+his neck. 'Pears like he jes' gotter let his haid drap furward. Dar ain'
+no use talkin', boss, dat hinge wuks ovuhtime. I 'spec' mine done it,
+too, jes' like you say, 'long 'bout 'leven. Yas, suh, I reckon dat's
+right."
+
+"How about the time between midnight and two in the morning? Was the
+hinge working then?"
+
+"Aw, boss," replied Roddy with something like reproach, "you knows 'tain'
+no queshun uv a hinge arftuh midnight. Arftuh midnight, boss, de screws
+drap right outen' de hinge, an' dar ain' no mo' hinge. You jes' natchelly
+keeps your haid down an' don' lif' it no mo'. Naw, suh, dar ain' no hinge
+to he'p you dat late, _on_less--_on_less somebody hit you or stab you."
+
+Braceway became stern. His eyes snapped.
+
+"Didn't you carry Mr. Morley's grips up to his room for him that night,
+room number four hundred and twenty-one?"
+
+"Yas, suh."
+
+"What time was that?"
+
+"Dat wuz jes' five minutes arftuh two, boss."
+
+"Had you been asleep during the two hours before that?"
+
+"I hates to say it, boss, but I wuz, almos' completely."
+
+"Then, how did you wake yourself up thoroughly enough to know that it was
+exactly five minutes past two?"
+
+"Lemme see, suh. Possibilly, 'twuz bekase uv whut I seen 'long about
+ha'fpas' one--possibilly, boss."
+
+"So you hadn't been asleep for two hours?"
+
+"Almos', suh. It wuz dis way: you see, boss, de bellboys' bench is right
+unduh de big clock in de lobby, off to de right uv de desk. I happen' dat
+night to let my haid slide ovuh 'g'in de glass case uv de clock, an when
+it stahted out to hit de ha'fpas' bell, it rattled an' whizzed, an' it
+jarred me. Golly, boss! I woke up an', when I seed how it wuz rainin'
+outside, I thought lightnin' had hit me. It skeered me--an' dat is one
+good way to wake up a nigger at night--skeer 'im, an' you don' have to
+stab him. I sorter hollered.
+
+"I got up an' went to de main entrance, jes' to make de night clerk think
+I wuz on de job in case he woke up. I looked down de street tow'rd de
+post-office, an' I seed a man goin' in dar.
+
+"'Bless de Lawd!' I says to myse'f. 'White people ain' got much to
+do--goin' to de post-office dis time uv night.' An' I went on back to de
+bellboys' bench and stahted in niggerin' it once mo'e."
+
+"Niggering it?"
+
+"Yas, boss; you know, dat means quick sleepin'. 'Peared to me I ain' no
+mo'e got my eyes shut when I wakes up ag'in, an' right dar in de lobby is
+dat same man what I seed gwine to de post-office."
+
+"What waked you up?"
+
+"I don' know, boss. I can' no mo'e figger dat out den I kin fly. Dat wuz
+de fust time in my life dat I done wake up at night when onmolested."
+
+"How did you know the man you saw in the lobby was the one you had seen
+going into the post-office?"
+
+"Dey wuz de same, boss; dat's all. Had de same buil', same long raincoat
+on, an' same thick beard. He had done pass' me by an' wuz on his way up
+de stairs 'stead uv waitin' foh me to run de elevatuh. I wouldn' nevuh
+seed his beard dat time, but he turn' 'roun' when he wuz nigh to de top
+uv de stairs an' look back at me. Den I seed foh a fac' dat he wuz de
+same as de yuther man I jes' done seed."
+
+Braceway gave no sign of how highly he valued the negro's words. Seated
+by the window, the dollar bill still on his knee, he kept his gaze on
+Roddy, holding him to his narrative.
+
+"You want me to believe that, when you saw this man two blocks away at
+half-past one in the morning, you noticed he wore a beard? Wasn't it
+too dark?"
+
+"Naw, suh. Dem post-office lights is pow'ful, boss. I seed de beard all
+right, an' I seed it once mo'e when he wuz on de stairs."
+
+"What did he do after he had looked back at you while he was going
+upstairs?"
+
+"Nothin', boss. He seed I wuz lookin' at him, an' he jes' went on up an'
+out uv sight, in a hurry, like."
+
+"What time was that?"
+
+"Dat wuz twenty-six minutes uv two."
+
+"How do you know that? You'd gone back to sleep, hadn't you?"
+
+"Yas, suh, a little niggerin'. But, when I woke up dat way widout no
+reason, I kinder jumped. I wuz afeer'd dat clock might be goin' to jar me
+ag'in, an' I took a look at it. Dat wuz how I seed de time. It wuz
+twenty-six minutes uv two."
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"Nothin', boss; jes' went on niggerin' it. Dat is, I went on till de
+night clerk giv' me a kick on de shins and tole me to take Mistuh
+Morley's bags up to fo'-twenty-one. I done tole you dat was five minutes
+arftuh two. Den, when we got up to de room, I says to him: 'I thought you
+wuz in dis hotel half-hour ago, boss, when you had a beard.'
+
+"An' right off de bat I wuz sorry I said dat. He look' at me kinder mad
+an' he said: 'Whut you talkin' 'bout, boy? You mus' be talkin' in yore
+sleep!'
+
+"I come on back downstairs. He didn' have to say no mo'e. I tell you,
+boss, when a white man tell me I been talkin' in my sleep, I _is_ been
+talkin' in my sleep--dar ain' no argufyin' 'bout it--I _is_ been doin'
+dat ve'y thing."
+
+"But you thought Mr. Morley, the man with the grips, was the one you had
+seen going up the stairs and, also, the one you had seen going into the
+post-office--and, when you saw him on the stairs and on the street, he
+wore a beard? Is that it?"
+
+"I ain' thought nothin' 'bout it, boss. I knowed it."
+
+"What did you think about his shaving off the beard at that time in the
+morning?" Braceway urged, fingering the dollar bill. "Didn't you think
+it was queer?"
+
+"I tryin' to tell you, suh, I ain' done no thinkin' 'bout dat. He done
+said I wuz talkin' in my sleep, an' I is a prudent nigger."
+
+"Did he have a gold tooth, Roddy?"
+
+"Naw, suh," said Roddy, "but he did look rich 'nough to have one.
+Leastways I ain' seen he had one."
+
+"Have you seen the man with the beard since?"
+
+"Naw, suh. I jes' tole you, boss, he done shave it off."
+
+"And Mr. Morley?"
+
+"Yas, suh, I done seen him. He's in de hotel now. He's de same man."
+
+"Did he wear rubber overshoes when he had the beard, and when he didn't
+have it?"
+
+"Yas, suh--bofe times."
+
+"Has he said anything to you since Monday night?"
+
+"Naw, suh."
+
+"Did you see anybody else that night--Monday night?"
+
+"Naw, suh."
+
+"Do you remember anything else about how the bearded man looked?"
+
+"Naw, suh, 'cep' he look' jes' like dis Mistuh Morley; dat's all I know,
+boss."
+
+Braceway got to his feet.
+
+"All right, Roddy," he said heartily; "you're a good boy. Here's your
+dollar."
+
+Roddy rolled his white eyeballs toward the ceiling and bent his black
+face floorward.
+
+"Gawd bless you, boss! You is one good----"
+
+"And here's another dollar, if you can keep your mouth shut about this
+until I tell you to open it. Can you do that?"
+
+Roddy conveyed the assurance of his ability to remain dumb until a
+considerable time after the sounding of Gabriel's trump.
+
+"See that you do. If you don't, I might have to arrest you after all."
+
+When the negro had gone, Braceway stood at the window and, with glance
+turned toward the street, saw nothing of what was passing there. He was
+reviewing the facts--or possible facts--that had just come to him.
+Restlessness took hold of him. He fell to pacing the length of the room
+with long, quick strides. It seemed that, in the labour of forcing his
+brain to its highest activity, he called on every fibre and muscle of his
+physique. His cheeks were flushed; his eyes, hard and brilliant, snapped.
+
+He was thinking--thinking, going over every particle of the evidence he
+had drawn from Roddy, trying to estimate its value when compared with
+everything else he had learned about the case. His stride grew more
+rapid; his breathing was faster.
+
+The murder, the men and women connected with it, the stories they had
+told, all these flashed on the screen of his mind and hung there until he
+had judged them to their smallest detail.
+
+What could Abrahamson have meant by indicating a belief that the man with
+the gold tooth looked like George Withers?
+
+Was the boy Roddy wide enough awake that night to have formed any real
+opinion as to the resemblance of the bearded man and Henry Morley?
+
+The trip to the post-office--did that explain the disappearance of the
+stolen jewelry? Had Morley mailed it at once to himself, or somebody
+else, in Washington?
+
+Withers had returned to the Brevord early Monday night. That must have
+been before half-past twelve. Although the night clerk and the bellboy
+had been asleep at the time and had not seen him, there was no room for
+doubt of his return as he had described it.
+
+And why should Morley, wearing the disguise, have waked up Roddy and
+assured himself, by the look flung over his shoulder, that the negro saw
+him on the stairs?
+
+Or had that been Morley, after all? What reason, what motive----
+
+Suddenly, with the abruptness of a horse thrown back on his haunches, he
+stood stock still in the middle of the room, his brilliant eyes staring
+at the wall, his breathing faster than ever, as he considered the idea
+that had flashed upon him. The idea grew into a theory. It had never
+occurred to him before, and yet it was right. It must be. He had it! For
+the first time, he felt sure of himself, was convinced that he held a
+safe grasp on the case.
+
+He strode to the window and struck the sill with his fist. The tenseness
+went out of his body. He breathed a long sigh of relief. He had seen
+through the mist of puzzling facts and contradictory clues. The rest
+would be comparatively plain sailing.
+
+Some of Braceway's friends were in the habit of laughing at him because,
+when he was sure of having solved a criminal puzzle, he always could
+be seen carrying a cane. The appearance of the cane invariably foretold
+the arrest of a guilty man.
+
+He went now to the corner near the bureau and picked up the light
+walking-stick he had brought to Furmville strapped to his suitcase. He
+lingered, twirling the cane in his right hand. His thoughts went to the
+interview he and Bristow had had that morning with Fulton, whose white
+hair and deep-lined face were very clear before him. He recalled the old
+man's words:
+
+"She wept bitterly. I can hear her weeping now. She had a dash, a spirit,
+a joyous soul. This man none of you has been able to find has been in
+Enid's life for a good many years."
+
+Braceway's eyes softened.
+
+Well, there was no need to worry now. Things were coming his way. The old
+man would have his revenge. He put on his hat, deciding to go down for a
+late lunch. When he looked at his watch, he whistled. He had promised to
+be at the railroad station to see the funeral party off for Atlanta on
+the four o'clock train; and it was now half-past three. He hurried out.
+
+For the first time in his life, he had been guilty of taking a course
+which might lead to serious results, or to no results at all. He had
+permitted personal considerations to make "blind spots" in his brain.
+
+Because of a warm friendship for George Withers, he had rushed to
+conclusions which took no account of the dead woman's husband. He had
+forgotten that the faces of Morley and Withers were shaped on similar
+lines. If any other detective had done that, Braceway would have been the
+first to censure him.
+
+As he had expected, he found Withers and Mr. Fulton far ahead of train
+time. They had been passed through the gates and were standing on the
+platform. Braceway noticed that, of the two, the father was standing the
+ordeal with greater fortitude and calmness. Withers was nervous,
+fidgety, and seemed to find it impossible to stand in any one place. He
+drew Braceway to one side.
+
+"I've got something to tell you, Brace," he said in a low tone, his voice
+tremulous. "I didn't want to tell you for--for her sake. I thought it
+might cause useless talk, scandal. But you're working your head off for
+me, and you've a right to know about it."
+
+"Don't worry, George," Braceway reassured him. "Things are coming out all
+right. Don't talk if you don't feel like it."
+
+He said this because he was suddenly aware of the quality of suffering
+he saw in the man's eyes. It was so evident, so striking, that he felt
+surprised. Perhaps, he thought, he might have exaggerated things when he
+had told Bristow that Enid had subjected her husband to incessant
+disappointments and regrets. Withers now was mourning; in fact, he
+appeared overwhelmed, crushed.
+
+"It's this," Withers hurried on: "I was up there that night in front of
+the house until--until after one o'clock. You know I told you I was on
+the porch just across the road and went back to the hotel as soon as
+Campbell had turned his machine and gone home. That wasn't quite correct.
+I waited, because Enid didn't turn out the lights in the living room. It
+struck me as strange.
+
+"I waited, and I fell asleep. That seems funny--a husband infuriated with
+his wife and trying to find out what she is doing to deceive him goes
+to sleep while he's watching! But that's exactly what I did.
+
+"When I awoke, the lights were still on in the living room. I looked at
+my watch, and, although I couldn't see very well, I made out it was after
+one. I suppose I'd been asleep for half an hour at least. You see, I had
+had a hard night on the sleeper and a terrific day, and----"
+
+"Sure. I understand that," Braceway consoled him. "Did you see anything,
+George?"
+
+"Yes; I saw something all right," he struggled with the words. "As I
+looked up, a figure was silhouetted against the yellow window shade. It
+was a man's figure. It was after one in the morning, and a man was there
+with----"
+
+His voice failed him altogether. Braceway, a perplexed look in his eyes,
+studied him uneasily.
+
+"The silhouette was quite plain. There was the clear-cut shadow of him
+from the waist up. It was so plain that I could see he was wearing
+a cap. I could see the visor of it, you know; a long visor. He was a
+well-built man, good shoulders, and so on.
+
+"As I got to my feet, the lights were turned off. I went across the
+street. I don't think I ran. It was raining. I was going to kill him.
+That was all I was thinking about. I was going to kill him, and I wanted
+to catch him unawares. I wasn't armed, and I was going to choke him to
+death."
+
+The train gates were opened, and passengers began to stream past them
+toward the train. Withers lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper. Braceway
+noticed the unpleasant sound of it.
+
+"He did what I expected; came down the steps without a sound. I didn't
+even hear him close the door. I can't say I saw him. It was pitch dark,
+and I sensed where he was. I was conscious of all his movements. When he
+reached the bottom step, I closed with him. I couldn't trust to hitting
+at him. It was too dark.
+
+"I put out my hands to get his throat, but I misjudged things. I caught
+him by the waist. He had on a raincoat. I could tell it by the feel of
+the cloth. And I couldn't get a good hold of him. While I struggled with
+him, he got me by the throat. He was a powerful man, a dozen times
+stronger than I am.
+
+"We swayed around there for a few minutes, a few seconds--I don't know
+which. We didn't make any noise. I couldn't do a thing. He choked me
+until I thought my head would burst open.
+
+"When he realized I was all in, he gave me a shove that made me reel down
+the walk a dozen steps. He didn't stop to see what I did. He ran. That
+is, I suppose he ran. I didn't hear him, and I didn't see him again. He
+disappeared--completely."
+
+Braceway looked at his watch. It was five minutes before train time.
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"Where did you go, then? What did you think? Speed up, George! I want to
+get all this before you go."
+
+"Yes," said Withers, a little catch in his throat; "I thought you ought
+to know about it. I--I stood there a moment, there in the rain, dazed,
+trying to get my breath. I'd intended going in to have it out with Enid.
+But I didn't. I suppose I knew, if I did, I'd kill her. And I guess now
+I would have.
+
+"You see, I hadn't the faintest notion that anything had happened to her;
+had hurt her, I mean. I got myself in hand. I didn't do anything. I went
+back to the hotel. I planned to have a last talk with her later in the
+day."
+
+"Tell me," Braceway asked with undisguised eagerness, "did this man wear
+a beard?"
+
+"I think so. I've been thinking about that all day. I think he did, but
+I'm not sure."
+
+"But you saw the plain silhouette, the outline of his head and body!"
+
+"Yes. He might have had a beard, and again he might not. He was heavily
+built, with a short, thick neck, and, in the attitude he was in,
+foreshortened by the light being above him, a strong chin might have
+been magnified, might have cast a shadow like that of a beard."
+
+"And when you were struggling with him? How about that? Didn't you get
+close to his face?"
+
+"Yes; but he was taller than I was--I don't know--I can't remember. But I
+think he had the beard, all right."
+
+"He didn't make any noise on the steps, you say. Did he have rubber
+shoes?"
+
+"I don't know. My guess would be that he did."
+
+The conductor began to shout, "All aboard!"
+
+They started toward the Atlanta pullman.
+
+"I wouldn't have told you--I can't see that any of this could affect the
+final result--but for the fact that something might have come up to
+embarrass you," Withers explained, still with the unpleasant, rattling
+whisper. "It might have led you to think I hadn't been frank with you."
+
+He had his foot on the first step of the car. The porter was evidently
+anxious to get aboard and close the vestibule door.
+
+"What do you mean?" Braceway caught him by the sleeve.
+
+"Somehow," Withers leaned down to whisper, "in the struggle, I think, I
+dropped--I lost my watch. Somebody must have picked it up, you know."
+
+"Damn!" exploded Braceway angrily. "Why didn't----"
+
+The train began to move. The porter put his hand to Withers' elbow and
+hurried him up the steps.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A MESSAGE FROM MISS FULTON
+
+
+It was a little after three o'clock when Chief Greenleaf and Lawrence
+Bristow finished their "celebration dinner" and took their seats on the
+porch of No. 9. The host, accomplishing the impossible in a prohibition
+state, had produced a bottle of champagne, explaining: "Just for you,
+chief; I never touch it;" and the chief had enjoyed it, unmistakably.
+
+At Bristow's suggestion they refrained from discussing any phase of the
+murder during the meal.
+
+"All we have to do now," he said, "is to see that the knot in Perry's
+rope is artistically tied--and that's not appetizing."
+
+"I've got something new," Greenleaf contributed; "but you're right. We'll
+wait until after dinner."
+
+They were greatly pleased with what they had accomplished; and each one,
+without giving it voice, knew the other's pleasure was increased by the
+thought that they had got the better of Braceway.
+
+They saw from the porch that an automobile was standing in front of
+No. 5. As they settled back in their chairs, Fulton and George Withers
+left the bungalow and got into the machine.
+
+"They're going to take the body to Atlanta on the four o'clock," said
+Greenleaf.
+
+For a moment they watched the receding automobile. Then Bristow inquired,
+"What's the new thing you've dug up?"
+
+"The report from the Charlotte laboratories."
+
+"Oh, you got that--by wire?"
+
+The lame man seemed indifferent about it.
+
+"Yes; by wire," Greenleaf paused, as if he enjoyed whetting the other's
+curiosity.
+
+Bristow made no comment. He gave the impression of being confident that
+the report could contain nothing of value.
+
+"You ain't very anxious to know what it is," the chief complained. "I
+nearly had a fit until it came."
+
+"Oh, it doesn't matter much, one way or the other," Bristow said,
+conscious of Greenleaf's petulance. "The thing's settled anyway."
+
+"That may be true; but it don't do any harm to get everything we can. The
+laboratory reported what you thought they'd report. Nothing under Miss
+Fulton's nails; particles of a white person's skin, epidermis, under
+Perry's."
+
+Bristow laughed pleasantly, his eyes suddenly more alight.
+
+"I beg your pardon, chief; I was having a little fun with you--by
+pretending indifference. But it's great--better than I'd really dared
+expect. It's the only direct, first-hand evidence we can offer showing
+that the negro, beyond any dispute, did attack her."
+
+He laughed again. "Let's see the wire."
+
+"I guess it settles the whole business," Greenleaf exulted, passing him
+the telegram.
+
+He read it and handed it back.
+
+"After that," he commented, "I'm almost tempted to throw away what I had
+to show you; its importance dwindles."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"A confession by Lucy Thomas that Perry went to Number Five the night,
+rather the morning, of the murder."
+
+"You got that--from her!" exclaimed Greenleaf.
+
+"Yes--signed."
+
+"Mr. Bristow, you're a wonder! By cripes, you are! My men couldn't get
+anything out of her. Neither could I."
+
+"Here it is. I wrote out her story and read it back to her, and she
+signed it."
+
+Greenleaf took the paper and read it:
+
+  "I know Perry Carpenter went to Mrs. Withers' house Monday night. He
+   and I had been drinking together, and I was nearly drunk, but he was
+   only about half-drunk. He told me he knew where he could get a lot of
+   money, or 'something just as good as money,' because he had seen 'that
+   white woman' with it. He and I had a fight because he wanted me to
+   give him the key to Mrs. Withers' house, to her kitchen door.
+
+  "He broke the ribbon on which I used to hang the key around my neck,
+   and he went out. That was pretty late in the night. Before daylight,
+   he came back and flung the key on the floor, and he cursed me and hit
+   me. I had two keys on the ribbon, one to Number Five, Manniston Road,
+   and one to the house where I worked before I went to Mrs. Withers. He
+   had taken the wrong one. When he hit me, he said: 'You think you're
+   damn smart, giving me the wrong key; but that didn't stop me.' He
+   seemed to be drunker then than he was when he went out earlier in the
+   night.
+
+  (Signed) "Lucy Thomas."
+
+The chief whistled. "How in thunder did you get this out of the woman?"
+
+"Sent for her and had a talk with her. She told so many stories and
+contradicted herself so much that, at last, she broke down and let me
+have the real facts."
+
+"Will she stick to what she says in this paper?"
+
+"Oh, yes. There won't be any trouble about that."
+
+Greenleaf offered him the signed confession.
+
+"No; keep it," he said. "It's your property, not mine."
+
+The chief folded it and put it carefully into his breast pocket.
+
+"I wonder," he speculated, "what Mr. Braceway will say to this."
+
+"He'll realize that the case is settled. But I don't think he'll quit
+work."
+
+"Why won't he, if he sees we've got the guilty man?"
+
+"That's what I'd like to know. I believe--this is between you and me--I
+believe he's working more for George Withers now than he is for the
+state. You see, as I've already told you, there may be some family
+scandal in this, something the husband wants to keep quiet. Braceway will
+be satisfied as soon as we show him that the only thing we want is to
+present the evidence against the negro; that we take no interest in
+private scandals. But there's one thing, however, chief, I wish you'd do:
+let Morley go to Washington on the midnight train tonight instead of
+making him wait until tomorrow."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"If Braceway won't let matters drop as they are now, he'll insist on
+following Morley to Washington. If he does, I'm going, too; and we might
+as well get it over."
+
+"You're not afraid our case won't hold water, are you?"
+
+"No. The case stands on its own feet. There's no power on earth that
+could break it down."
+
+"Well, then, why----"
+
+"I'll tell you why, chief. I've been set down here with this
+tuberculosis. You know what that means, at least, several years of
+convalescence. Why shouldn't I make use of those years, develop a
+business in which I can engage while I'm here? This murder case has
+opened the door for me, and I'm going to take advantage of it. Lawrence
+Bristow, consulting detective and criminologist. How does that strike
+you?"
+
+"Fine!" said Greenleaf heartily. "And you're right. Your reputation's
+made; and, even if you had to be away from Furmville a few days at a time
+now and then, it wouldn't hurt your health."
+
+The chief's tendency to claim credit for Carpenter's arrest had
+disappeared. He liked Bristow, was impressed by his quiet effectiveness.
+
+"I'm glad you think I can get away with it," the lame man said, much
+pleased. "Now, you see why I want to go to Washington with Braceway. It's
+merely to keep my hold on this case. If you say I'm entitled to the
+credit for reading the riddle, I'm going to see that I get the credit."
+
+"All right. I'll let Morley know he can go tonight, and he needn't worry
+about our troubling him."
+
+"Thanks. The sooner we gather up every little strand of evidence, the
+better it will be."
+
+Greenleaf prepared to leave. As he stood up, he caught sight of a young
+man coming up Manniston Road.
+
+"A stranger," he announced. "Another detective?"
+
+Bristow glanced down the street.
+
+"No. It's a newspaper correspondent. That's my guess. The Washington and
+New York papers have had time to send special men here by now for feature
+stories."
+
+The young man went briskly up the steps of No. 5.
+
+"I was right," concluded Bristow. "If you run into him, chief, do the
+talking for the two of us. Just tell him I refuse to be interviewed."
+
+"Why?" demanded Greenleaf. "An interview would give you good
+advertising."
+
+"There's just one sort of publicity that's better than talking," said
+Bristow laconically; "aloofness, mystery. It makes people wonder, keeps
+them talking."
+
+It happened as Bristow had thought. Greenleaf, going down the walk, met
+the stranger, special correspondent of a New York paper. They had a short
+colloquy, the newspaper man looking frequently toward No. 9, and finally
+they turned and went down Manniston Road.
+
+Bristow, leaving his chair to go back to the sleeping porch, saw Miss
+Kelly come out of No. 5 and hurry in his direction. He waited for her.
+
+"Miss Fulton wants to see you, Mr. Bristow," said the nurse. "She asked
+me to tell you it's very important."
+
+He was frankly surprised.
+
+"Wants to see me, Miss Kelly?"
+
+"Yes; at once, if you can come."
+
+"Why, certainly."
+
+He stepped into the house and got his hat.
+
+"How is Miss Fulton?" he inquired, descending the steps with Miss Kelly.
+
+"Much better. In fact, she seemed in good spirits and fairly strong as
+soon as her father and Mr. Withers left. That was about half an hour
+ago."
+
+"Perhaps, their departure helped her," he suggested, smiling. "Often
+one's family is annoying--we may love them, but we want them at a lovable
+distance."
+
+She gave him an approving smile.
+
+"What about the medicine?" he asked as they reached the door. "Has she
+had much bromide--stuff like that?"
+
+"No; not today. Her mind's perfectly clear."
+
+He put one more question:
+
+"Do you happen to know why she wishes to see me?"
+
+"I think it's something about her brother-in-law, Mr. Withers."
+
+"Ah! I wonder whether----"
+
+He did not finish the sentence, but, stepping into the living room,
+waited for Miss Kelly to announce his arrival.
+
+The quick mechanism of his mind informed him that he was about to be
+confronted with some totally unexpected situation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+MISS FULTON'S REVELATION
+
+
+Prepared as he was for surprise, his emotion, when he was ushered into
+Miss Fulton's room, was little short of amazement. The girl was
+transformed. Instead of a spoiled child, with petulant expression, he
+beheld a calm, well controlled woman who greeted him cordially with a
+smile. Overnight, it seemed, she had developed into maturity.
+
+Wearing a simple, pale blue negligee, and propped up in bed, as she had
+been the day before, she had now in her attitude nothing of the weakness
+she had shown during his former interview with her. For the first time,
+he saw that she was a handsome woman, and it was no longer hard for him
+to realize why Braceway had been in love with her. He waited for her to
+explain why he had been summoned.
+
+"I've taken affairs into my own hands--that is, my affairs," she said.
+"There's something you should know."
+
+"If there is anything----" he began the polite formula.
+
+"First," she told him, "I'd better explain that father ordered me to
+discuss the--my sister's death with nobody except Judge Rogers. You know
+who he is, the attorney here. Father and George have retained him. I
+haven't seen him yet. I wanted to give you certain facts. I know you'll
+make the just, proper use of them."
+
+"Then I was right? You do know----"
+
+"Yes," she said, exhibiting, so far as he could observe, no excitement
+whatever; "I was not asleep the whole of Monday night. I narrowly escaped
+seeing my sister die--seeing her murdered."
+
+Her lips trembled momentarily, but she took hold of herself remarkably. A
+trifle incredulous, he watched her closely.
+
+"I heard a noise in the living room. It wasn't a loud noise. The fact
+that it was guarded, or cautious, waked me up, I think. Before I got out
+of bed, I looked at my watch. It was somewhere in the neighbourhood of
+one o'clock--I'm not sure how many minutes after one. As I reached the
+little hallway opening into the dining room, I heard a man's voice.
+
+"He was not talking aloud. It was a hurried sort of whisper. It seemed as
+if the voice, when at its natural pitch, would have been high or thin,
+more of a tenor than anything else. It gave me the impression of
+terrific anger, anger and threat combined. The only thing I heard from
+my sister was a stifled sound, as if she had tried to cry out and been
+prevented by--by choking."
+
+She looked out the window, her breast rising and falling while she
+compelled herself to calmness.
+
+Bristow was looking at her with hawk-like keenness.
+
+"And what did you do?" he asked, his voice low and cool.
+
+"I pulled the dining room door open. From where I stood, looking across
+the dining room into the living room, I could see the edge of my sister's
+skirt and--and a man's leg, the right leg.
+
+"That is, I didn't see much of his leg. What I did see was his foot, the
+sole of his shoe, a large shoe. He was in such a position that the foot
+was resting on its toes, perpendicular to the floor, so that I saw the
+whole sole of the rubber shoe."
+
+She put both hands to her face and closed her eyes, holding the attitude
+for several minutes. When she looked at him again, there were no tears
+in her eyes, but the traces of fear.
+
+"It seemed to me that he was leaning far forward, putting most of his
+weight on his left foot and balancing himself with the right thrust out
+behind him. There was something in the position of that leg which
+suggested great strength.
+
+"All that came to me in a minute, in a second. When I realized what I
+saw, the danger to Enid, I fainted, just crumpled up and slid to the
+floor, and everything went black before me. I don't think I had made a
+sound since leaving the sleeping porch."
+
+Bristow spoke quickly.
+
+"Miss Fulton, who was the man?"
+
+She overcame a momentary reluctance.
+
+"I'm not sure," she said slowly. "I am not sure. I thought it was either
+Henry Morley or George Withers."
+
+She turned away. A tremor shook her from head to foot.
+
+"Why?" he asked.
+
+"First, the voice," she replied, her face still averted. "It could so
+easily have been Mr. Morley's high voice lowered to a whisper; or it
+might have been George Withers'. When he's angry, his deep voice
+undergoes a curious change; it's horrid."
+
+"And the second reason?"
+
+"The man wore rubbers." She turned her face toward him. "I had seen Mr.
+Morley put his on two hours before that."
+
+"How about your brother-in-law?"
+
+"He's a crank on the subject--never goes out in the rain unless he has
+them on."
+
+"Think a moment, Miss Fulton. Couldn't that man have been a negro--the
+negro who is now held for the crime? He wore rubber-soled shoes. Could
+you swear that what you saw was not a rubber sole attached to a leather
+or canvass shoe?"
+
+"No; I couldn't."
+
+"And the voice? Did you hear any of the man's words? Could you swear that
+it wasn't the illiterate talk of an uneducated negro?"
+
+"No; I couldn't."
+
+"What made you think of Morley and Withers?"
+
+"Mr. Morley was in a raging temper with my sister when he left me--in
+connection with money matters. You know about that part of the affair?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And George's voice is always like the one I heard. It's like that when
+he gets--used to get--into a temper with Enid."
+
+Bristow felt immensely relieved. He was so sure of his case against Perry
+Carpenter that he refused to consider anything tending to obscure his own
+theory.
+
+"Are you still sure it was Mr. Morley or Mr. Withers?"
+
+"I think now," she answered, her voice hardly above a whisper, "it was
+George Withers."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Let me explain again. I lay there, where I had fainted, for hours, until
+just a few minutes before you answered my call for help. I must have had
+a terrific shock. When I recovered consciousness, I stumbled into the
+living room and saw--saw Enid. Her--oh, Mr. Bristow!--the sight of her
+face, of her mouth, paralyzed my voice.
+
+"I stood on the porch and tried to scream, but at first I couldn't. I
+only gasped and choked. I started down the steps, reached the bottom, and
+then found I could make myself heard. I ran back up the steps and stood
+there shrieking until I saw you coming. I suppose nobody had seen me go
+down the steps."
+
+"But that hasn't anything to do with Mr. Withers?"
+
+"Yes--yes, it has. When I went down the porch steps, I saw something
+lying in the grass, on the upper side of the steps, the side toward your
+house."
+
+She slipped her hand under one of the pillows.
+
+"It was this."
+
+She handed to Bristow an open-faced gold watch. He read on the back of it
+the initials, "G. S. W."
+
+"It's George Withers' watch," she said, "and, when I found it, he had not
+been on this side of Manniston Road, according to the story he told you
+and the chief of police."
+
+Bristow was thinking intently, a frown creasing his forehead. He was
+wishing that she had not found the watch. He reminded himself of the
+hysterical condition she had been in the day before. Perhaps, after all,
+this story was nothing but an unconscious invention--a fantasy which she
+thought to be the truth.
+
+"Why did you refuse yesterday to tell me this; and why do you volunteer
+it now?" he inquired, holding her glance with a cold, level look.
+
+"I'm afraid you won't understand," she answered, a little smile lifting
+the corners of her mouth, a smile which, somehow, still had in it a great
+deal of sorrow. "Yesterday I was still under the influence of the way I
+had lived all my life, subjugated, as it were, by the fact that my older
+sister was my father's favourite and by the further fact that my sister's
+personality was stronger than mine--at least, I had been taught to think
+so.
+
+"I don't want you to think I didn't love my sister. I did; but it made a
+cry-baby out of me. I always relied on others--do you see? But now, that
+influence is gone. I'm my own mistress; and I know it. I can and must do
+what strikes me as right."
+
+Bristow, close student of human nature that he was, did understand. There
+flashed across his mind a passage he had read in something by George
+Bernard Shaw: that nobody ever loses a friend or relative by death
+without experiencing some measure of relief.
+
+"Yes; I see what you mean," he assented; "its an instance of submerged
+personality--something of that sort."
+
+"Mr. Braceway is working with you, isn't he?" she asked suddenly.
+
+"Why, yes," he replied, surprised.
+
+"I thought," she continued, "that what I had seen would be of service
+to you and him. And I can't understand why father and George want
+all this secrecy. One would think they were afraid of finding out
+something--something to make them ashamed! What I want is to see the
+guilty man punished--that's all."
+
+He recalled Braceway's statement that he had been engaged to marry Maria
+Fulton. Could it be that she still loved him, and that the engagement to
+Morley, her helping him financially, had been all a pretense, the pitiful
+product of pique toward Braceway to show him she cared nothing for him?
+And now she wanted to help Braceway, not Bristow?
+
+He decided to ignore that part of the situation. The obvious
+incrimination of Withers gave him enough to think about. He was sorry it
+had happened. He did not believe there was the shadow of a case against
+him.
+
+He rose and handed the watch to Miss Fulton.
+
+"No," she objected; "I don't want it. You and Mr. Braceway, perhaps, will
+make use of it."
+
+He hesitated before putting it into his pocket.
+
+"Why did you send for me, Miss Fulton?" he asked, after thanking her for
+doing so. "Why me instead of your lawyer, Judge Rogers?"
+
+"He would have forbidden me to talk," she answered simply; "and I wanted
+to talk. I refuse ever again to carry around with me other people's
+secrets. It's too oppressive."
+
+"Have you told this to anybody else?--or do you intend to?"
+
+"No; nobody; and I won't."
+
+"Now, one thing about Mr. Morley: do you think he has stolen money--from
+his bank, for instance?"
+
+"Why, no! He was speculating--and losing. I'm glad you asked about him.
+I shall never see him again--never!"
+
+Bristow left her with the assurance that he and Braceway would make the
+best possible use of her theory and the facts she had adduced. He walked
+slowly back to his bungalow, his limp more pronounced than usual. He felt
+physically very tired.
+
+But of one thing he was still certain: the strength of his case
+against Perry Carpenter. He chose to stick to that, much more stubbornly
+than Braceway had refused to consider minutely the exact situation of
+Withers in regard to the crime. If Withers had murdered his wife,
+circumstances were now ideally in his favour. The two men, unusually
+brainy, quick thinkers, who were recognized by the police and the public
+as able to bring punishment on the guilty man, had other and opposing
+theories--theories which they were resolved to "put over," to
+substantiate. As matters stood now, the story Bristow had just heard was
+hardly a factor. The detectives were busy with ideas of their own.
+
+Maria Fulton, after the lame man had left her, lay back against her
+pillows and looked out the window with misty eyes. Counteracting the
+sorrow that had weighed upon her for two days, was her speculation as to
+how Braceway would receive the facts she had revealed.
+
+Would he see that her course was one which she intended to be of help to
+him?--that, not knowing how he would treat a direct message from her, she
+had sent it to him through another?--that she desired, above all things,
+his success in the investigation?
+
+"When I spoke to this man of Sam Braceway, my whole manner was a
+revelation of how I felt--a frank declaration! And, of course, he will
+tell him. If he doesn't----"
+
+She called Miss Kelly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+WHAT'S BRACEWAY'S GAME?
+
+
+Braceway, keeping his promise to have another conference with Bristow,
+sat on the porch of No. 9 and watched the last golden streamers the
+setting sun had flung above the blue edges of the mountains.
+
+He still carried his cane.
+
+"What's your plan now, Mr. Braceway?" Bristow inquired. "You think you'll
+follow Morley to Washington?"
+
+"Not follow him," the detective answered smilingly. "I'm going with him.
+That is, I'll take the same train he does."
+
+"Greenleaf told you, I suppose, that he'd given Morley permission to
+leave tonight?"
+
+"Yes--said you suggested it. And I think you're right. There's no use in
+losing time unnecessarily. Are you going, too?"
+
+"Oh, by all means," Bristow said quickly, "and against my doctor's
+orders. That is, if you don't object--if you don't think I'd be in the
+way."
+
+Braceway was clearly aware of the lame man's desire to accompany him so
+as to be associated with every phase of the work on the case, and to make
+it stand out emphatically in the long run that he, Bristow, pitting his
+ingenuity against Braceway, had gathered the evidence establishing the
+negro's guilt beyond question. The idea amused him, he was so sure of the
+accuracy of his own theory.
+
+"Not at all," he said heartily. "I want you to come."
+
+"How about avoiding him on the train? We don't want him to know we're his
+fellow-travellers."
+
+"Oh, no. He'll get aboard at the station here. I have a machine to take
+me--and you, of course--to Larrimore, the station seven miles out.
+They'll flag the train. We'll get into a stateroom and stay there; have
+our meals served right there. You see, we don't get into Washington until
+dark tomorrow night."
+
+"Yes; I see. The scheme's all right."
+
+They were silent for several minutes.
+
+"I've been thinking," said Bristow, "about Mrs. Withers having kept all
+her jewelry in the bungalow--unprotected, you know--nobody but her
+sister and herself there. It was risky."
+
+"Yes," agreed Braceway. "What do you get from that?"
+
+"Perhaps she was waiting--knew demands for money might come at any
+time--and was afraid to be caught without them."
+
+"Exactly. That's the way I figured it."
+
+They were silent again.
+
+Braceway was the first to speak. He narrated all the facts he had learned
+from Abrahamson and Roddy, and concluded with the story Withers had told
+him on the station platform. He held back none of the details. Evidently,
+his irritation toward Withers had subsided. When Bristow handed him the
+watch Maria Fulton had found, he said laughingly:
+
+"It's a good thing George told me about it, isn't it? Otherwise, we might
+have had to devote a lot of time to showing that he had nothing to do
+with the crime itself."
+
+"And yet," qualified Bristow, "he said nothing to explain why the watch
+should have been so far back in the grass and to the side of the steps in
+this direction. According to his story, he must have dropped it on the
+other side, the down side."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I don't see how it could have fallen where Miss Fulton found it unless
+somebody had actually picked it up and thrown it there. He told you he
+was all the time down on the sidewalk, and, when the other man flung him
+off, he reeled down-hill, not up."
+
+"That's hair-splitting," Braceway objected good-humouredly. "Nothing
+could make me think George responsible for the murder."
+
+Bristow repeated then everything Maria Fulton had said that afternoon,
+and gave a fair, clear idea of her strong suspicion that the murder had
+actually been done by either Withers or Morley. It had no effect on
+Braceway.
+
+"Miss Fulton," he said, "told you, of course, what she had seen and heard
+and, in addition, what she had guessed. But I don't see that it changes
+anything. I can't let it make me suspect Withers any more than I can
+accept as valuable Abrahamson's quite positive opinion that the man
+wearing the disguise was Withers. Things don't fit in. That's all. They
+don't fit into such a theory."
+
+"Have you ever thought," persisted Bristow, "why Withers told Greenleaf
+and me yesterday morning that he was in the pawnshop when the man with
+the gold tooth was in there? Why should he say that when Abrahamson
+contradicts it at once by telling you they were at no time in the shop
+simultaneously?"
+
+"Did Withers say to you outright, flat and unmistakably, that he saw the
+fellow inside the shop?" Braceway's voice had in it the ring of
+combativeness.
+
+Bristow tried to remember the exact words Withers had used. Also, his
+harping on Withers' possible guilt struck him as absurd when he
+considered the strength of the case against Perry.
+
+"I can't swear he did," he admitted at last; "but there's no doubt about
+the impression he gave us. Why, Abrahamson himself told you Greenleaf was
+positive Withers and the other man were there at the same time."
+
+"Oh," Braceway said, obviously a little bored, "That's one of the things
+we have to watch for in these cases--wild impressions, the construing of
+words in a different way by everybody who heard them. It's a minor detail
+anyway."
+
+"I don't get you at all," Bristow said, eyeing him intently.
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Your conviction that Morley's the guilty man, your refusal to accept the
+case against Perry Carpenter, and your impatience in discussing Withers."
+
+"Think over Miss Fulton's story," Braceway retorted. "If it does anything
+at all, it strengthens the suspicion that Morley's the man we want. And
+Roddy's story--on its face, it damns Morley! Withers had no motive
+except, a remote possibility, that of jealousy. Morley's motive was as
+old as time; the desperate need of money."
+
+"Well, let's grant that, for the moment. What do you do with the evidence
+against the negro? He was after money."
+
+Braceway laughed.
+
+"To tell the truth," he admitted, "I don't do anything with it. I'll go
+further: it seems flawless, and yet----"
+
+His face settled into serious lines.
+
+"The report from the laboratory is unanswerable," Bristow went on. "It's
+as good as a statement from an eyewitness."
+
+"Yes; it is. Still, in some way, I don't feel sure--But I'll say this: if
+my trip to Washington, our trip, isn't successful, I'll quit guessing and
+theorizing. I'll agree, without reservation, that Perry's the man."
+
+Bristow hesitated before making his next remark:
+
+"Of course, I'm not employed by Withers. My only connection with the case
+is a volunteer one. Yours is entirely different--and I realize that there
+may be--well--things you know and don't want me to know. But I can't help
+wondering whether Morley is the only consideration that takes you to
+Washington, whether there mightn't be something else relating, in a way,
+to the case--relating to it and yet not necessarily tied to it directly."
+
+"What kind of something?" Braceway retorted.
+
+"Say, for instance, something ugly, something painful to Fulton and
+Withers--terrific scandal, perhaps."
+
+Braceway thought a moment.
+
+"You've a keen mind, Mr. Bristow," he said finally. "I can't discuss that
+phase of it now, but you're partially right; although I'll say frankly,
+if Morley wasn't going to Washington, I wouldn't go either."
+
+"Thanks; I appreciate your telling me that much. Now, let me ask one more
+question: why, exactly are you following Morley?"
+
+"I'll tell you," Braceway replied with spirit. "It's a fair question, and
+I'll answer it. I'm going there on a hunch. I can't persuade myself that
+Perry's guilty, and I've a hunch that I'm now on the trail of the right
+man. And, as long as I'm in the business as a professional detective, I
+don't propose to disregard one scintilla of evidence, one smallest clue.
+I'll run down every tip and any hunch before I'll quit a case, saying
+virtually: 'Well, that man, or this man, _seems_ guilty; go ahead and
+string him up.'
+
+"No innocent man's going to his death as long as I feel there's a chance
+of the guilty fellow being around and laughing up his sleeve. That's the
+whole thing in a nutshell. That's why I'm after Morley! That's why I'm
+going to Washington."
+
+Bristow, responding warmly to the other's voice and mood, leaned forward
+and grasped his hand.
+
+"Good!" he said. "That's fine--and I'm with you."
+
+"It's the only way to look at this work. Without the proper ideals, it's
+a rotten business. But, with the right viewpoint, it's great, at times
+far more valuable than the work of lawyers and judges."
+
+"I'm glad you said that," Bristow declared; "very glad, because I'm
+thinking of going into it myself."
+
+"You are?" Braceway appeared surprised; or his emotion might have been
+sympathy for a man driven to the choice of a new profession in life.
+
+"Yes. I was talking about it to Greenleaf this afternoon. I realize--I'd
+be foolish if I didn't--that this case has given me a lot of publicity.
+It has put me where I can say I know something about crime and criminals,
+although, up until this murder, the knowledge has been mostly on paper."
+
+"Yes; I know."
+
+"But now, since I'm stuck down here for this long convalescence, it's the
+best thing I can do; in fact, it's the only thing. I've drifted through
+life fooling with real estate and writing now and then a little, a very
+little, poor fiction. Neither occupation would support me in Furmville;
+and I think I could make good as a sort of consulting detective and
+criminologist. There's money in it, isn't there?"
+
+"Yes; good money," Braceway replied without much enthusiasm. "But there
+are times when it's heart-breaking work, this thing of running down the
+guilty, the scum of the earth, the failures, the rotters, and the rats.
+It isn't all a Fourth of July celebration with the bands playing and your
+name in the papers."
+
+"Oh, I understand that. Any profession has its drawbacks."
+
+"But you have the analytical mind. And, as I just said, there's money in
+it."
+
+The glow had faded from the sky, and, with the darkness, there had come a
+noticeable chill in the air. Braceway yawned and stretched his arms. In
+addition to his talks with Abrahamson, Roddy, and Withers, he had also
+interviewed Perry and Lucy Thomas.
+
+"By George!" he said explosively. "I'm tired. I don't know when I've been
+this tired. This has been a real day, something popping every minute
+since I got here this morning."
+
+Bristow did not answer that. He was thinking of the impression he had
+received from Maria Fulton that she was still in love with Braceway. He
+had had that idea quite vividly while talking to her. He wondered now
+whether he had better mention it to Braceway. No, he decided; the time
+for that would come after the grinding work in Washington. Bristow
+himself was far from being a sentimental man. If he had been in
+Braceway's place, he would have preferred to hear nothing about the girl
+and her emotions until after the completion of the work.
+
+"Are you packed up?" Braceway asked. "Ready to go?"
+
+"Almost."
+
+"Well, suppose we drift on down to the Brevord. No; I forgot. You'd
+rather drive down, wouldn't you? Walking would bother that leg. I'll send
+the machine up for you."
+
+"Thanks," Bristow accepted appreciatively. "That will be best."
+
+"All right. I'll have it up here in an hour or so. You can pick me up,
+and we'll run out to Larrimore."
+
+He went down Manniston Road, his heels striking hard against the
+concrete. Under the light at the far corner he flashed into Bristow's
+vision, twirling his cane on his thumb; his erect, alert figure giving
+little evidence of the weariness he had felt a few minutes before.
+
+The lame man lingered on the porch, considering Braceway's confident
+assertion that he did not "propose to disregard one scintilla of
+evidence, one smallest clue." But, he reflected, that was exactly what
+Braceway was doing: not only disregarding one scintilla, but keeping
+himself blind to a great many clues, the evidence against George Withers
+and that against the negro.
+
+"I can't make out his game," he concluded. "What's his idea about
+scandal, I wonder? The only possible scandal lies in the fact that Mrs.
+Withers paid blackmail for years. And the only way to make the fact
+public is to keep on denying that Perry's guilty. He seems to be trying
+to dig up scandal instead of hiding it."
+
+Suddenly, with his characteristic quickness of thought, he realized that
+he disliked Braceway, definitely felt an aversion for him. When he was
+in Braceway's presence, influenced by his vitality and magnetism and
+listening to his conversation, he lost sight of his real feeling; but,
+left to himself, it came to the surface strongly. He wished he had never
+met the man. He knew he would never get close to him. And yet, he
+thought, why dislike him?
+
+"Oh, he isn't my kind. _I_ don't know. Yes, I know. He's just an edition
+de luxe of the ordinary four-flusher, a lot of biff-bang talk and bluff."
+He laughed, perhaps ridiculing himself. "Why waste mental energy on him?
+I've worked this case out. He hasn't."
+
+And public opinion was with him. It conceded that he had the right answer
+to the puzzle. At that very moment the "star" reporter of _The Sentinel_
+was hammering out on his typewriter the following paragraph for
+publication in the morning:
+
+"While it is generally recognized that Chief Greenleaf deserves great
+praise for the promptness with which the guilty man was discovered, the
+chief himself called attention this evening to the invaluable assistance
+he had received from Mr. Lawrence Bristow, already a well-known authority
+on crime. It was Bristow who, in addition to other brilliant work, forged
+the last and most impressive link in the chain of evidence against
+Carpenter. He did this by suggesting that the tests be made to determine
+whether or not the negro's finger nails showed traces of a white person's
+skin."
+
+Later on in his story, the reporter wrote:
+
+"Not a clue has yet been uncovered leading to the location of the stolen
+jewelry."
+
+If Braceway could have read that, he would have said: "Wait until we get
+to Washington. That's where we'll come across the jewels. Give us time."
+
+Bristow, having a different opinion, would have refused to divulge it.
+The last thing he expected, was any such result in Washington.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+AT THE ANDERSON NATIONAL BANK
+
+
+When the train pulled into Washington at eleven o'clock, Henry Morley,
+the first passenger to alight, shook off the red-cap porters who grabbed
+at his grips, and hurried toward the gates. Braceway, well hidden by
+shadows just inside the big side-door of one of the baggage coaches,
+observed how pale and haggard he looked under the strong glare of the
+arc-lights.
+
+"Hardly more than a kid!" thought the detective, with involuntary
+sympathy. "Why is it that most of the criminals are merely children? If
+they were all hardened and abandoned old thugs this work would be
+easier."
+
+Nevertheless, he kept his eyes on Morley and, a moment later, moved a
+step forward. This made him visible to a well-dressed, sleek-looking man
+who up to that time had been standing on the dark side of the great steel
+pillar directly across the platform from the baggage car. Braceway, with
+a quick gesture, indicated the identity of Morley, and the sleek-looking
+man, suddenly coming to life, fell into the stream of street-bound
+passengers.
+
+Braceway went back to the Pullman and rejoined Bristow, who was waiting
+for him in the stateroom.
+
+In the taxicab on their way to the Willard Hotel, the lame man lay back
+against the cushion, apparently tired out and making no pretense of
+interest in anything. Braceway muttered something inaudible.
+
+"What's that?" Bristow asked, opening his eyes.
+
+"I'd been thinking what a pity it is that most criminals are youngsters.
+When you nab them, you feel as if they hadn't a fair show; it hardly
+seems a sporting proposition. After that, I soothed myself by considering
+the satisfaction one feels in landing the old birds, the ones who know
+better."
+
+"I can appreciate that," the other agreed. "That may be one reason why
+I'm glad I've fastened the thing on an ignorant negro rather than on a
+fellow like Morley."
+
+"You've too much confidence in circumstantial evidence, Bristow. I
+remember what an old lawyer once told me: 'Circumstantial evidence is
+like a woman, too tricky--and tells a different story every day.'"
+
+At the Willard, finding that adjoining rooms were not to be had, they
+were put on different floors. Going toward the elevators, Braceway said:
+
+"Unless something unexpected turns up, let's have breakfast at eight."
+
+"And then, what?"
+
+"Go to the Anderson National Bank. A man named Beale, Joseph Beale, is
+its president. We'll have to persuade him to have the records examined,
+to see how Morley stands. If he's wrong, short, the rest will be easy."
+
+"Very good. Did your man pick him up at the train?"
+
+"Oh, yes. Platt's always on the job. He and his partner, Delaney,
+generally deliver."
+
+"Who are they?" Bristow asked, interested. "How do they happen to be
+working for you?"
+
+"They belong to a private bureau here, Golson's. Golson and I have worked
+together before."
+
+In the elevator Bristow was thinking that the matter of becoming a
+professional detective was not as simple as it had appeared to him. The
+work required colleagues, assistants, "shadowers," and reciprocal
+arrangements with bureaus in other cities. It was like any other
+profitable business, complicated, demanding constant attention.
+
+When they met at breakfast, Braceway had already received Platt's report.
+
+"Nothing developed last night," he told Bristow. "Platt followed Morley,
+who went straight to his home. He and his mother live in a little house
+far out on R Street northwest. Morley took the street car and was home by
+a little after half-past eleven. The lights were all out by a quarter
+past twelve. This morning at six-thirty, when Delaney relieved Platt, our
+man hadn't left the house."
+
+"What's your guess about today?"
+
+"Either he'll go to the bank on time this morning, to throw off
+suspicion," said Braceway, "or, if he mailed the jewelry to himself here
+the night of the murder, he'll try to pawn them in Baltimore or at a
+pawnshop in Virginia, just across the river. There are no pawnshops in
+Washington. There's a law that interferes."
+
+"Delaney won't lose him?"
+
+"Not a chance."
+
+During the meal he saw that Bristow was completely worn out. As a matter
+of fact, he looked actually sick.
+
+"See here," Braceway said as they were ready to leave the table; "you
+look all in, done out."
+
+Bristow did not deny it.
+
+"I didn't sleep very well last night. It was close in my room, and this
+morning the humidity's oppressive. You know what that does to us of the
+T. B. tribe."
+
+"Suppose you get some more rest. It's going to be a sweltering day."
+
+"Oh, I can stand it. I want to go with you. I'm not going to feel any
+worse than I do now."
+
+But the other was insistent. Bristow at last gave in. He would take the
+rest if Braceway would report progress to him at noon.
+
+Returning to his room, the sick man swore savagely.
+
+"Friday!" he said aloud. "Damn it all anyway!"
+
+Braceway lingered several minutes on the steps outside the Anderson
+National Bank. He felt reluctant to go inside and start the machinery
+that would ruin Morley. It wasn't absolutely necessary, he argued, with
+something like weakness; he could, perhaps, find out all he wanted to
+know without----
+
+He thought suddenly of the bizarre performances of the thing men call
+Fate. Because a woman is murdered under mysterious circumstances in a
+little southern city, evidence is uncovered showing that a panic-stricken
+boy has been stealing money from a bank hundreds of miles away; a
+detective is employed by the dead woman's husband; the detective is
+thrown again into contact with the victim's sister and realizes more
+clearly than ever that he loves her.
+
+What would be the result of it all--the result for him? He remembered the
+gown she had worn to a ball, something of the palest yellow--how the blue
+of her eyes and the gleam of her hair had been emphasized by the simple
+perfection of the gown. What would she say if he went back to----
+
+He forced himself down to reality.
+
+He entered the bank and discovered that Morley had not reported for work.
+Having presented his card to a chilly, monosyllabic little man, he was
+shown, after a short wait, into a private office where, surrounded by
+several tons of mahogany, Mr. Joseph Beale reigned supreme.
+
+Mr. Beale struck him as a fattened duplicate of Mr. Illington, thin of
+lip, hard of eye, slow and precise in enunciation. In spite of his
+stoutness, he had the same long, slender fingers, easy to grasp with, and
+the same mechanical Punch-and-Judy smile. When he greeted the detective,
+his voice was like a slow, thin stream that had run over ice.
+
+"I'm not on a pleasant mission, Mr. Beale," Braceway began. "It's
+something in the line of duty."
+
+The bank president looked at the card which had been handed to him.
+
+"Ahem!" he said, with a lip smile. "You're a detective?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, Mr. Braceway, what is it? Let's see whether I can do anything for
+you. At least, I assume you want----"
+
+This ruffled Braceway.
+
+"I want nothing," he said crisply; "and I'm afraid I'm going to do
+something for you."
+
+The banker stiffened.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It's one of your employes; in fact, it's your receiving teller."
+
+"What! Henry Morley! Impossible, sir! Outrageous! Preposterous!"
+
+"Just a moment, if you please," put in Braceway. "I was going to say that
+I was positive about nothing. I've been compelled to suspect, however,
+that Mr. Morley might be short in his accounts. There are unexplained
+circumstances which seem to connect Mr. Morley with the murder of a
+woman. Therefore----"
+
+"One of the--one of my employes a thief and a murderer!" Mr. Beale pushed
+back his chair and fell to patting his knees with his fists. "Great God,
+Mr.----" He looked at the card again. "Why, Mr. Braceway, I can't believe
+it. It would be treason to this bank, treason to all its traditions!" He
+had not suffered such an attack of garrulity for the past twenty years.
+"And Morley, his family, his birth! By George, sir, his blood! Are we to
+lose all faith in blood?"
+
+"As I wanted to say," Braceway managed to break in, "the murder of Mrs.
+George S. Withers in Furmville, North Carolina, led----"
+
+This was the crowning blow. Mr. Beale gasped several times in rapid
+succession, not entirely hiding his slight, cold resemblance to a fish.
+
+"Mrs. Withers!" he got out at last. "The daughter of my old friend, Will
+Fulton! Fulton, one of our depositors!"
+
+He was reduced to silent horror.
+
+Braceway took advantage of his condition and outlined the circumstances
+in considerable detail.
+
+"If he's short in his accounts," he concluded, "the motive for the murder
+is established. And, if he's been stealing from the bank, you want to
+know it."
+
+Mr. Beale pushed a bell-button.
+
+"Charles," he said to the chilly little man, "tell Mr. Jones I want to
+speak to him. Our first vice-president," he explained to Braceway.
+
+Mr. Jones, evidently dressed and ready for the part of president of the
+bank whenever Mr. Beale should see fit to die, came in and, with frowns,
+"dear-dears" and tongue-clucking, heard from the president the story of
+what had befallen the Anderson National.
+
+"How soon," inquired Beale, "can we give this--er--gentleman an answer,
+a definite answer, as to whether Morley, the unspeakable scoundrel, is a
+thief?"
+
+Mr. Jones considered sadly.
+
+"Perhaps, very soon; two o'clock or something like that--and again it may
+take time to find anything. Suppose we say five or half-past five this
+afternoon; to be safe, you understand. Half-past five?"
+
+"Very well," agreed Beale, and turned to Braceway: "Will that be
+satisfactory?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+Braceway left them, their mask-like faces plainly damaged by anxiety;
+their cool, slow utterance slightly humanized by the realization that
+they must act at once. In fact, as the detective closed the door of the
+private office, Mr. Jones was reaching with long, slender fingers for the
+telephone. They would need the best accountant they could find for the
+quick work they had promised Braceway.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+THE DISCOVERY OF THE JEWELS
+
+
+Braceway returned to the lobby of his hotel, and, having bought half
+a dozen New York newspapers, settled down to wait for a report from
+Golson's bureau concerning Morley's movements. A little after eleven he
+was called to the telephone.
+
+"Your man caught the eight o'clock train for Baltimore." Golson himself
+gave the information. "Delaney also caught it. They got to Baltimore
+at nine. Your man took a taxi straight to the shop of an old fellow named
+Eidstein, reaching there at twenty minutes past nine. He and Eidstein
+went into Eidstein's private office back of the shop and stayed there for
+over an hour, in fact until about half-past ten. Your man came out and
+went to a down-town hotel. He was there when Delaney, still sticking to
+him, managed to get a wire to me telling me what I've just told you."
+
+"Fine!" said Braceway. "What was he doing in the hotel? Did he meet
+anybody, or write anything?"
+
+"Delaney didn't say."
+
+"Who's this Eidstein, a pawn broker?"
+
+"No; he's a dealer in antiques: furniture, old gold, old jewels, anything
+old. He stands well over there. He's all right. I know all about him."
+
+"That's funny, isn't it?"
+
+"What's funny?"
+
+"That he didn't go to a pawnshop."
+
+"Keep your shirt on," laughed Golson. "The day's not over yet."
+
+"No doubt about that. What about Corning, the loan-shark in Virginia?"
+
+"I've got a man over there, just as you asked. Shall I keep him on?"
+
+"Sure!" snapped Braceway. "Suppose Morley gives Delaney the slip in
+Baltimore and doubles back to Corning's! Keep him there all day."
+
+He left the telephone and went up to Bristow's room, No. 717. When he
+knocked, the door was opened by a young woman in the uniform and cap
+of a trained nurse.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he began, "I got the wrong room, I'm afraid. I----"
+
+"This is Mr. Bristow's room," she said in a low tone. "Are you Mr.
+Braceway?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Come in, then, please." She stepped back and held open the door. "Mr.
+Bristow's still very weak, but he told me to let you in. He said he must
+see you as soon as you arrived."
+
+Braceway saw that there was no bed in the room, and asked where the sick
+man was. The nurse pointed to a closed door leading into the adjoining
+room.
+
+"What's the matter with him?" he asked. "By George! He hasn't had a
+hemorrhage, has he?"
+
+"Yes, sir. That's exactly what he has had. The doctor says all he needs
+now is rest. He doesn't think there's any real danger. Will you go in to
+see him?"
+
+She quietly opened the door to the sickroom. Braceway went in on tiptoes,
+but Bristow stirred and turned toward him when the nurse put up the
+window shade.
+
+"You'll have to lie still, Mr. Bristow," she cautioned on her way out.
+"It's so important to keep these ice-packs in place."
+
+"Thanks, Miss Martin; I shall get on," he answered in a voice so weak
+that it startled Braceway.
+
+"I don't think you'd better talk," said his visitor. "Really, I
+wouldn't."
+
+Bristow gave him a wry smile.
+
+"It's nothing serious; just a--pretty bad hemorrhage," he said, finding
+it necessary to pause between words. "The boneheaded Mowbray--my
+physician in Furmville, you know--was right for once. He said--this might
+happen."
+
+"I'm going out and let you sleep," Braceway insisted, displaying the
+average man's feeling of absolute helplessness in a sickroom.
+
+"No, not yet. The fellow I had in--knows his business--put ice on the
+lung and on my heart--gave me something to lessen the heart action."
+
+"And you're not in pain?"
+
+"No. I'll be all right in--in a little--One thing I wanted to--tell you.
+Quite important--really."
+
+He mopped his forehead with tremulous, futile little dabs which
+accentuated his weakness. Braceway instinctively drew his chair closer
+to the bed so as to catch all of the scarcely audible words.
+
+"Just occurred to me," the sick man struggled on, "just--before I had
+this hemor--Ought to have somebody, extra man, working with Platt and
+Delaney. Tell you why: if Morley mailed the jewelry that--night of
+the murder, he wasn't fool--enough to mail it to himself or to his
+own--house. If he visits anybody today--we ought to have an extra man
+with Delaney. Delaney can keep on Morley's trail--extra man can watch
+and--if necessary, question anybody Morley visits or consults with.
+Then----"
+
+"Correct!" exclaimed Braceway. "Right you are! Who says you're sick? Why,
+your bean's working fine. Don't try to talk any more. I'm going out to
+get busy on that very suggestion."
+
+"Another thing," Bristow said, lifting a feeble hand to detain his
+visitor. "Come up here at six--this evening, will you? I'll have my
+strength back by that time. Don't laugh. I will. I know I will. I've had
+hemorrhages before this."
+
+"What do you want to do at six?"
+
+"Help you--be with you when you question Morley. Promise me. I'll be in
+shape by that time."
+
+Braceway promised, and went into the outer room.
+
+"Do you think," he asked Miss Martin, "there's the slightest chance of
+his getting up this evening, or tonight?"
+
+"I really don't know," she smiled. "There may be. It all depends on his
+courage, his nerve. Anyway, he won't be able to do much, to exert
+himself."
+
+"He's got the nerve," Braceway said admiringly; "got plenty of it. By the
+way, how did it happen? How do you happen to be here?"
+
+"It seems that at about a quarter to ten Mr. Bristow called the
+downstairs operator and asked her to send a bellboy to his room,
+number seven-seventeen. When the boy came in here, Mr. Bristow was
+lying across the foot of his bed, pressing to his mouth a towel that
+was half-saturated with blood.
+
+"He had dropped his saturated handkerchief on the bathroom floor. And he
+evidently had been bleeding when he was at the telephone. He was awfully
+weak, so weak that the boy thought he was dying. He couldn't speak. The
+boy remembered having seen the house physician, Dr. Carey, at a late
+breakfast in the cafe, and got him up here at once. Dr. Carey called me
+to take the case as soon as he had seen Mr. Bristow.
+
+"I think that's all. Of course, the bed that was in here and all the
+other soiled things had been removed by the time I came in; and the
+management insisted on his taking the extra room."
+
+"Thank you," said Braceway. "I'm glad to get the details. You'll see that
+he has everything he needs, won't you?"
+
+A few minutes later, when Miss Martin entered the bedroom to lower the
+window shade, Bristow told her:
+
+"I think I'll sleep now. Shut the door and, on no account, let--anybody,
+doctor or anybody else--wake me up. You call me at six, please. What
+time is it now? Twelve-fifteen? Remember, you'll let me sleep?"
+
+Braceway went to his own room to brush up for lunch. Although he had not
+taken the trouble to tell Bristow, he had already arranged with Golson to
+have the "extra man" on the job. He was taking no chances. He smiled when
+he thought of the sick man's eagerness to give him advice.
+
+It occurred to him that he should have communicated with George Withers.
+The funeral was over; had been set for yesterday. He would send him a
+wire as soon as he went downstairs.
+
+"By George!" Braceway communed with himself. "If I hadn't been his
+friend, I probably would have worried him. Even if Morley has embezzled
+from the bank, how closely have I coupled him with the crime? Not very
+closely unless he tries to pawn, or produces, some of the stolen
+stuff--not any more closely than George has coupled himself with it!
+George acted like such an ass!"
+
+He was about to leave the room when, for the first time, he looked the
+situation squarely in the face and made an important acknowledgment to
+himself. There had been in his mind, ever since that train had pulled out
+of Furmville with George's rattling whisper still sounding in his ear,
+the desire and the plan to safeguard George. He had felt, on this trip,
+that, if his theory about the case broke down, it might be advisable,
+even necessary, to produce all the evidence possible to shield his friend
+either from ugly gossip or from the down-right charge of murder. He did
+not believe for a moment that Withers was guilty.
+
+If things went wrong in the next eight or ten hours, if it was proved
+that Morley had nothing to do with the murder, the thing he wanted above
+all else was a story from Morley that he, Morley, had seen the struggle
+in front of No. 5 as Withers had described it. Somehow, that story about
+the struggle had struck him as the weakest link in George's whole story.
+
+He had resolutely refused to consider it up to now, but he no longer
+could dodge it. He had come to Washington to catch the criminal. But he
+also had come with the subconscious plan of getting at anything that
+would help Withers.
+
+He stood for an instant, jangling the room key in his hand. A frown drew
+his brows together. The frown deepened. He unlocked the door, went back
+into the room, and put down his cane, leaning it against the wall near
+the bureau.
+
+He reached the lobby in time to hear a callboy paging him. There was a
+telegram for him. It read:
+
+  "Mr. S. S. Braceway, Willard Hotel, Washington, D. C.
+
+  "Here.
+
+  (Signed) "Frank Abrahamson."
+
+"What the devil does he mean?" he asked himself several times. "What's
+this 'here' about?"
+
+He thought a long time before he remembered having asked the Furmville
+pawn broker to try to recall where he had seen the bearded man in
+another disguise, a disguise which, apparently, had consisted of nothing
+but a black moustache and bushy eyebrows. And Abrahamson had promised
+to wire him if he did remember. The "here" meant it was in Furmville that
+he had seen the moustached man.
+
+He went to the telegraph desk and wrote out a message:
+
+  "Mr. Frank Abrahamson, 329 College Street,
+   Furmville, N. C.
+
+  "Silence.
+
+  (Signed) "Braceway."
+
+"One-word telegrams!" he smiled grimly. "Thrifty fellows, these chosen
+people."
+
+He found the telephone booths and called up Golson.
+
+"Got anything from Baltimore?" he inquired.
+
+"Just been talking to Delaney on long-distance," Golson answered without
+enthusiasm.
+
+"Well! What is it?"
+
+"Your man gave him the slip a quarter of an hour ago, and he wants----"
+
+"Gave him the slip!" shouted Braceway. "What are you talking about?"
+
+"I don't like it any more than you do," snapped Golson. "But that's what
+happened: gave him the slip."
+
+"How?"
+
+"I didn't get that exactly. Delaney merely said he lost him in the hotel.
+Your man was evidently waiting there for a message or phone call. If he
+received it, Delaney was fooled. Anyway, he's gone now; and Delaney wants
+to know what he's to do. What'll I tell him?"
+
+"Tell him to go to hell!" Braceway said hotly. "No! Tell him to go back
+to Eidstein's and wait there until Morley shows up. That's his only
+chance to pick him up again."
+
+"O.K.," growled Golson.
+
+"Say! Put somebody on the job of watching for the incoming trains from
+Baltimore, will you? Right away?"
+
+"Platt's just come into the office. I'll send him to the station at
+once."
+
+"What time did Delaney lose sight of Morley?"
+
+"Twelve forty-five."
+
+Braceway hung up the receiver and looked at his watch. It was ten minutes
+past one. He had fifty minutes to kill before keeping an appointment he
+had made with Major Ross, chief of the Washington police.
+
+After a quick lunch, he strolled over to the news-stand and picked up the
+early edition of an afternoon paper.
+
+The first headlines he saw were:
+
+     STOLEN GEMS FOUND
+     IN SUSPECT'S YARD
+
+Under these lines was a dispatch from Furmville giving the information
+that plain-clothes men of the Furmville police force had discovered the
+emerald-and-diamond lavalliere worn by Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers the night
+she was murdered. The jewelry had been found in the yard of the house
+where Perry Carpenter had lived. The lavaliere was concealed in tall
+grass immediately beneath the window of Carpenter's room, and thus had at
+first escaped the eyes of the police. When found, it was intact except
+for the six links that had been broken from the chain and dropped the
+night of the murder.
+
+Braceway threw down the paper and went to the Pennsylvania Avenue door.
+
+"Damn!" he addressed mentally the top of the Washington monument. "More
+grist for Bristow's mill! I'm not crazy, am I? I'm not that crazy, that's
+sure!"
+
+He set out to keep his appointment with Major Ross. After all, he felt
+reasonably sure of himself, and he had made up his mind to carry things
+through as he originally had intended. His shoulders were well back, his
+step elastic and quick. He flung off discouragement as if it had been an
+over-coat too warm for that weather.
+
+He would not permit Delaney's fiasco to annoy him. The Baltimore police
+had been tipped to watch the pawnshops; Delaney probably would pick
+Morley up again; and there was the extra man yet to be heard from.
+Besides, Morley would break down and confess cleanly after his fright on
+being arrested. Things were not so bad after all.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+BRISTOW SOLVES A PROBLEM
+
+
+Mr. Beale and Mr. Jones were, so far as their exteriors showed, nearly
+back to the normal iciness of their every-day appearance when Braceway
+found them in the president's office a few minutes after half-past five.
+He did not have to ask what they had discovered; their faces were frank
+confessions. He dropped into a chair and smiled.
+
+"How much?"
+
+Mr. Beale cleared his throat and moved his lips deliberately one against
+the other.
+
+"Before I say anything else, Mr.--er--Braceway, I want to express to you
+not only my own gratitude but that of all the officers and directors of
+the Anderson National. You have, it seems, saved us from great trouble.
+As things are, they are bad enough. But you have enabled us to put our
+fingers on the--ah--situation almost in time."
+
+He glanced at Jones.
+
+"Briefly," the vice-president took up the statement, "it has been
+established, thus far, that Morley has stolen from the Anderson National
+the--"
+
+Mr. Beale's composure broke down at this. He interrupted the
+subordinate's calm explanation:
+
+"Stolen from the Anderson National! Think of that, sir! Of all the
+outrageous things, of all the unqualifiedly and absolutely incredible
+things! We have in our bank, on our payrolls, a thief, an unmitigated
+scoundrel!" He pushed back his chair and drummed on his knees. "We find
+that one of his thefts was seven hundred dollars, and another five
+hundred. We--I--trusted him, trusted him! And with what result?"
+
+He slid his chair forward and bruised his fist by striking the desk with
+all his strength.
+
+"And the crudity of his methods! Preposterous! The old trick of entries
+in pass-books and no entries in the records! He chose, for his own
+safety, depositors who carried large balances and were not apt to draw
+out anywhere near their total balance. It's the most abominable----"
+
+Between the outbursts of the president and the cold, lifeless words of
+the vice-president, Braceway managed to elicit these facts: they expected
+to uncover more than the $1,200 shortage already established; when they
+could examine all the pass-books now out of the bank, the total would
+undoubtedly be found much larger; they demanded Morley's arrest at once;
+in fact, if the law had allowed it, they would have sent him to the
+scaffold within the next hour.
+
+"Now," the detective reminded them, "he's also under suspicion of
+murder."
+
+"My God!" spluttered Beale. "What do we care about murder? Hasn't he
+tried to murder this bank? Hasn't he assassinated, so far as he could,
+its good name? Get him! Put him behind the bars!"
+
+At last they agreed to Braceway's plan: Morley was to be arrested by one
+of Major Ross' plain-clothes men when he stepped off the train from
+Baltimore. It was to be done quietly, so that the news of it would not
+be in the morning's papers.
+
+He was then to be taken to one of the outlying police stations for the
+sake of privacy, was to be told that he was charged with embezzlement;
+and then, having been frightened by the arrest, he would be compelled to
+undergo the cross-examination of Braceway and Bristow, who wanted to
+prove or disprove his connection with the murder in Furmville.
+
+Braceway returned to the hotel to await a report from either Major Ross
+or Delaney.
+
+Delaney came into the lobby and joined him. They went straight to
+Braceway's room.
+
+"We caught the five o'clock in Baltimore and got here a little before
+six," the big man started his story. "One of the men from headquarters
+stepped up to him and arrested him. I figured you had arranged for it, so
+I beat it up here."
+
+"What happened in Baltimore?" asked Braceway in a tone so friendly that
+it dissipated much of the other's embarrassment.
+
+"I declare, Mr. Braceway," he said humbly, "I don't know how it happened.
+I never had such a thing hit me before. But I lost him slick as a
+whistle. I was in the bar of the hotel, and he was sitting in the lobby.
+I had my eye right on him, and he had no idea I was following him. Then,
+all at once, after I'd turned to the barkeeper just long enough to order
+a soft drink, I looked around, and he was gone. I combed the house from
+top to bottom, but it was no use. He had ducked me clean."
+
+"What time was that?"
+
+"Twelve-forty-five."
+
+"And then what?"
+
+"The chief gave me your message, and I went back to keep a look on
+Eidstein's place. I didn't think he'd show there again, but he did--at
+four o'clock and stayed there almost half an hour. After that, he went to
+the station, me right after him. We both caught the five o'clock for
+Washington."
+
+"Did you talk with Eidstein?"
+
+"No, sir; had no orders. But he's no loan-shark, and no fence. Eidstein's
+on the level. We know all about him."
+
+"How did Morley look when he showed up there the second time?"
+
+"Done up, sir, fagged out. That's what makes me uneasy. He'd been up to
+something that shook him, something that rattled his teeth. He looked
+it."
+
+"Pawning something, perhaps?"
+
+"That's just it--just the way I figured it--something he knew was
+risky--something that made him sweat blood."
+
+"Well, it's all right," Braceway concluded. "There's nothing for you to
+worry about. It may be that losing him was the best thing you ever did.
+I'm not sure, but it may turn out so."
+
+Delaney, greatly relieved, thanked him and left.
+
+Braceway hurried to the sick man's room and, having been ushered in by
+Miss Martin, found him, fully dressed, sitting on the edge of the bed. He
+was still pale and looked tired, but his voice was strong. He was setting
+down a half-empty glass of water on a tray near the bed, and his hand,
+although it wavered a little, had lost the helpless tremulousness
+Braceway had noticed at noon.
+
+"Hello!" said the visitor. "You're a wonder! I expected to find you
+prostrated."
+
+"Oh, no," Bristow answered quietly. "I knew the rest and sleep would
+bring me around all right, and Miss Martin has given me a twentieth of a
+grain of strychnine. What's the news?"
+
+"I'll sketch it to you. But how about dinner?"
+
+"I've arranged for us to have it up here, if you don't mind?"
+
+Braceway agreed, and Miss Martin straightened up the other room, where
+the meal was served.
+
+Bristow, restricting himself to clam broth, crackers, and coffee, heard
+the story of the day's developments with profound interest. Except for
+the little tremor in his fingers, there was no sign that he had been ill
+a few hours earlier. Not a detail escaped him. The whole thing was
+photographed on his mind, even the hours and minutes of the time at which
+this or that had occurred.
+
+"So," concluded Braceway, "you can see why I feel pretty fine! Morley's
+a thief, as I'd believed all along. The motive for the murder is
+established, particularly when you remember that Miss Fulton, who had
+been advancing him money, was prevented by her sister from doing so any
+further."
+
+"No; I can't see that," objected Bristow. "A motive? Yes; but not a
+motive for murder. So far as I can size it up, he wanted to steal more
+money, and that's all. It's a far cry between theft and murder."
+
+"You stick to your old theory, the negro's guilt?"
+
+"Naturally. There you have the motive and the murder--the proof that he
+said he would rob, and the indisputable evidence that he did rob and
+kill. Why, he brought away with him particles of the victim's body! What
+more do you want?"
+
+For a long moment their glances interlocked and held. In a sharp,
+intuitive way Braceway felt that Bristow suspected his concern about
+George Withers. He did not know why he suspected it, but he did. He was
+convinced that the other, with his darting, analytical mind, had gone to
+the secret unerringly.
+
+"Oh, well," he laughed, rising from the table, "if you're so fond of your
+own ideas, Bristow, you won't be of much use to me in questioning Morley
+tonight."
+
+"On the contrary," the other returned quickly, "I'm just as anxious as
+you are to get the truth out of him. As long as one man's story is left
+vague and indefinite, just that long you run the risk of somebody's
+coming forward with facts or conjectures to overthrow the theory you've
+advanced. It applies to my idea as well as to yours."
+
+"No doubt."
+
+"You know as well as I do," the lame man continued, "that, if Perry
+Carpenter isn't guilty, the next one to suspect logically is Withers."
+
+"What makes you say that?" The question was put sharply.
+
+"I've two reasons. In the first place, the facts and Withers' own story;
+in the second, common sense."
+
+The telephone rang. When Bristow answered it, a man's voice asked for
+Braceway. Major Ross himself was on the wire.
+
+"I had the man in Baltimore interviewed," he reported. "Here is his story
+in a few words: some years ago Morley's father bought from his shop a
+pair of earrings, each one set with an unusually valuable pigeon's-blood
+ruby, and gave them to Mrs. Morley. Young Morley, now in trouble, took
+him this morning the two stones and asked him to buy them back. He
+explained that it must be done secretly because he might be suspected of
+having been implicated in a murder.
+
+"He denied any guilt, but said it would embarrass him if the deal became
+known. The owner of the shop--you understand who--could not buy them
+back, but promised to raise money on them, something he'd never done
+before. He was greatly affected by Morley's grief and despair. He says
+the rubies are the ones he sold years ago."
+
+"Did he raise the money?"
+
+"He tried, but couldn't get the sum Morley wanted, seven hundred dollars.
+Finally, he did advance it from his own pocket."
+
+"And the stones? How do they compare with those on the list of Withers'
+stuff?"
+
+"Identical."
+
+"All right; thanks. We'll see you at eight."
+
+Braceway repeated the report to Bristow, eliciting the comment:
+
+"Is somebody trying to make fun of us--or what is it? If those rubies
+belonged to Mrs. Withers, one thing at least is certain: Morley was in
+the bungalow the night of the murder, and after the murder had been
+committed. Miss Fulton distinctly told me the only jewelry that had ever
+passed between her and Morley was the ring found in his room in the
+Brevord that morning."
+
+Braceway laughed aloud.
+
+"At last," he said, "You're beginning to see the light--or to appreciate
+the jungle we're running around in."
+
+He had arranged for them to meet Major Ross at the station house of
+No. 7 police precinct. Since it was off the principal beats of police
+reporters, Morley was detained there.
+
+Bristow went into his bedroom, where Miss Martin gave him another dose of
+strychnine. He asked her to await his return--not that he expected to be
+in need of her, he said, but just to be on the safe side. He waved aside
+Braceway's solicitousness about his strength.
+
+As they stepped into the corridor, a boy handed Braceway a telegram. He
+read it, and, without a word, handed it to Bristow. It said:
+
+  "Two diamonds and two emeralds, unset, apparently part of Withers
+   jewelry, pawned here about two-thirty this afternoon by medium-sized
+   man; a little slim; black moustache; high, straight nose; bushy
+   eyebrows; very thin lips; gray eyes; age between thirty and forty;
+   weight 140 pounds. Two pawnshops used. No trace of him yet."
+
+It was signed by the chief of the Baltimore plain-clothes force.
+
+"What do you think of that?" asked Braceway, his voice hard.
+
+"This Morley," answered Bristow, his voice equally hard, "must have lost
+his mind."
+
+They went down and took a cab.
+
+"That description," the lame man was thinking, as they rolled through the
+streets toward the northwest part of the city, "fits Withers perfectly,
+except for the moustache and the colour of the eyes. But that's absurd.
+I'd like to----"
+
+He began again to wonder what, in addition to the capture of the guilty
+man, had brought Braceway to Washington. With his highly sensitized
+brain, he had received the impression that there was joined to the case
+some event or interest of which he had not the slightest inkling. How was
+Morley hooked up with the hidden phase of the affair? He intended to know
+all they knew about the whole business.
+
+If Morley knew the secret--there was Maria Fulton! Incredulous for a
+moment, he considered an entirely new idea. His incredulity vanished--and
+he knew!
+
+He lay back against the cab cushion and laughed, silently. His mirth
+grew. His laughter was almost beyond control. This was the thing that had
+bothered him, the "hidden angle" that had escaped him. He laughed until
+he shook. He had to put his hand to his mouth to prevent bursting into
+prolonged, riotous guffaws.
+
+That was it--Withers and Fulton, and Braceway of course, were afraid of
+Morley, afraid of what he might say; not about events of the night of
+the murder, but what he might reveal concerning----
+
+He struggled again with his consuming mirth. He saw now that he had
+handled everything exactly as it should have been handled.
+
+Now, more than ever before, he was interested in what the embezzler would
+say under their examination and cross-questioning. It was like a game in
+which he, Bristow, was the assured winner before even the first move was
+made. He knew already the very thing they were so intent on concealing.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+A CONFESSION
+
+
+Bristow, satisfied now that he had fathomed Braceway's reluctance to
+accept as final the case against Perry Carpenter, had not been the only
+one mystified by the detective's course. Practically every other
+detective and police official in the country was wondering what secret
+motive had impelled Braceway to keep public attention focused on the
+tragedy after a flawless case against the real murderer had been
+established.
+
+They knew that he was in the employ of the husband and father of the
+murdered woman, and that, therefore, his acts had the endorsement of her
+family. What, then, they asked, was the true situation back of the
+pursuit and persecution of the bank clerk, Henry Morley?
+
+What possible interest could they have in running him down, in ruining
+his standing? What contingency was powerful enough to compel their
+approval of Braceway's forcing the conclusion upon the mind of the public
+that an ugly scandal had touched Mrs. Withers?
+
+And this question, at first whispered in the gossip in Furmville, had
+crept into the newspaper dispatches. The result was a morbid curiosity
+generally, and, in the minds of many, a belief that Braceway would fasten
+the crime on Morley. There were, however, a few who took the position
+that Morley, even if he had not committed the murder, had knowledge of
+some fact or facts even more terrible than the crime itself.
+
+Major Ross awaited the two men in a large, bare-walled room on the second
+floor of the station house. The night was oppressively warm, and the
+tall, narrow windows were thrown open. Like Braceway, Bristow took off
+his coat, the absence of it showing plainly the outline of his heavy belt
+and steel brace.
+
+Morley was ushered in and given one of the plain, straight-backed chairs
+with which the room was furnished. The only other furniture was a deal
+table, behind which Braceway, Bristow, and Major Ross sat in lounging
+attitudes. The major, aside from his interest in the case, was there
+merely as a matter of courtesy, a compliment to Braceway's reputation.
+
+The prisoner, a few feet from them across the table, was suggestive of
+neither resistance nor mental alertness. Above his limp collar and
+loosened cravat, his face looked haggard and drawn. It was without a
+vestige of colour save for the blue shadows under his eyes. There was a
+tremor on his lips almost continuously.
+
+Once or twice throughout the whole interview, his eyes brightened
+momentarily with a hint of cunning or attempted cunning. Except for these
+few flashes, he was manifestly beaten, unnerved, suffering from a
+simultaneous desire and inability to weigh and ponder what he said.
+
+Braceway began, in quick, incisive sentences:
+
+"You're up against it, Morley. You know it as well as we do. And we don't
+want to trick you or bully you. We're only after the truth. If you'll
+tell the truth, it will help you and us. Will you give us a straight
+story?"
+
+"Yes," he answered dully, his hands folded, like a woman's, against his
+body.
+
+Braceway put more imperiousness into his voice.
+
+"You know you're under arrest for embezzlement, don't you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you did take money from the Anderson National Bank?"
+
+Morley squirmed and looked at each of the three in front of him before he
+replied to that.
+
+"Yes," he said finally, swallowing hard, his voice high and strained.
+
+"Good! That's the sensible way to look at it," Braceway jogged him with
+rapid speech. "We needn't bother any more about that tonight. How about
+the jewelry you pawned in Baltimore today?"
+
+The prisoner licked his lips and fixed on Braceway a look that grew into
+a stare.
+
+"You mean the rubies?"
+
+"Well, yes."
+
+"I didn't pawn them, and--and they were my mother's."
+
+"How about the diamonds and emeralds?"
+
+"I had no diamonds and emeralds."
+
+"You didn't! Where were you all the afternoon preceding the time you
+showed up at Eidstein's?"
+
+This was his first intimation that he had been watched. He hesitated.
+
+"Do I have to tell that?"
+
+"Certainly. Why shouldn't you?"
+
+A film, like tears, clouded his weak eyes. His voice was disagreeably
+beseeching.
+
+"It would bring my mother into this," he objected, twining his fingers
+about each other and shuffling his feet.
+
+"You'll have to tell us where you were and what you did," Braceway
+persisted.
+
+"Oh, very well," he said desperately; "I was in a room in the Emerson
+Hotel with--with my mother. And I was--I was confessing to her that I'd
+stolen from the bank. She knew I needed money. I had told her I'd been
+speculating, and needed some extra money for margins. She gave me the
+rubies from her earrings; and she followed me to Baltimore. If I couldn't
+raise the money on the rubies, she was to borrow it on our house. She
+owns that."
+
+He paused, on the verge of tears.
+
+"Buck up!" Braceway prodded him. "You confessed to her, did you?"
+
+"Yes. At the last, somehow, I couldn't stand the idea of her giving up
+the last thing she had, but--but she would have done it."
+
+"Could she have mortgaged her home in Baltimore?"
+
+"Yes. Mr. Taliaferro, A. G. Taliaferro, the lawyer, would have fixed it
+for her. He's a friend of the family--used to be of father's."
+
+"Now, about the emeralds and diamonds?" Braceway began another attack.
+
+"I don't know what you mean."'
+
+"They belonged to Mrs. Withers."
+
+Morley shook his head impatiently.
+
+"I don't know anything about them."
+
+Bristow took a hand in the questioning, flicking him and provoking him by
+tone and word. But neither he nor Braceway could get an admission, or any
+appearance of admission, that he knew anything about the Withers jewelry.
+
+Furthermore, he declared that his presence in the hotel, from the time
+Delaney had "lost" him until his second appearance at Eidstein's at four
+o'clock, could be established by the room clerk, two bellboys, and a maid
+at the Emerson, and by the lawyer, Taliaferro, with whom he had talked on
+the telephone while there with his mother.
+
+According to him, he had unwittingly evaded Delaney by the simple act of
+stepping into the elevator and going to the room where his mother, having
+reached Baltimore an hour later than he, was waiting to hear how he had
+fared in his interview with Eidstein.
+
+He had hoped, he said, to cover up the $700 shortage at the bank with the
+money obtained from the dealer in antiques, but, thinking of the risk of
+his mother's being impoverished, he had renounced at the last moment the
+plan of getting more money through the mortgage or sale of the home.
+
+"Do you happen to know that a man, clumsily disguised and answering to
+your description, pawned some of the Withers jewelry in Baltimore today?"
+Braceway asked.
+
+"Did he?" He looked blank.
+
+"Yes. What do you know about it?"
+
+"I've already told you: not a thing."
+
+Braceway, recognizing the futility for the present of prolonging this
+line of inquiry, paused, looking at him thoughtfully.
+
+"If I pawned them," Morley added, without raising his eyes, "why wasn't
+the money found on me?"
+
+"Don't get too smart!" Bristow put in so roughly and suddenly that the
+prisoner started violently. "What we want is facts, not arguments!"
+
+The lame man leaned forward in his chair and made his voice sharp,
+provocative.
+
+"You're not as clever as you think you are. You lied when you made your
+statement about the night Mrs. Withers was murdered. Now, come through
+with that--the truth about it!"
+
+Morley, utterly bewildered, stared and said nothing.
+
+"What did you do that night? Where were you?"
+
+Bristow left his chair and, going round the table, stood in front of
+Morley.
+
+"I told you that once. I wasn't anywhere near Manniston Road."
+
+"Yes, you were! We've got proof of it. You _were_ there!"
+
+"What proof?"
+
+"You're curious about that, are you? I thought you would be! For one
+thing, the imprint of your rubber shoe on the porch floor of Number
+Five--"
+
+"No! No! I wasn't on the porch. I----" He checked the words, realizing
+that he had betrayed himself.
+
+"Not on the porch?" Bristow caught him up. "Where, then? Where?" He
+limped a step nearer to the prisoner. "Out with it now! You _were_
+there! You were there!"
+
+He stood over Morley, conquering him by the sheer weight of his
+personality.
+
+"I wasn't on the porch."
+
+"All right--not on the porch. But where?"
+
+Morley looked up at him and, mechanically, pushed his chair back, as if
+he felt the need of more space. Bristow, in his shirt-sleeves, his right
+arm held up, continued to crowd against him, threatening him, commanding
+him to speak.
+
+Braceway was amazed by the intensity of Bristow's glance, the tautness
+of his body, the harsh authority in his voice. This man who had been ill
+a few hours before exhibited now a strength and a vitality that would
+have been remarkable in anybody. In him, under the circumstances, it was
+nothing short of marvellous.
+
+Morley could not withstand him.
+
+"I don't know anything--anything worth while," he said weakly, trembling
+from head to foot. "I would have told it at the very--at the very first;
+only I thought it might keep me in Furmville too long. I wanted to get
+back here and----"
+
+"Never mind about what you wanted!" Bristow's hand fell and gripped his
+shoulder painfully, shook him, brought him back to the main issue. "What
+did you see? That's what we want to know, every bit of it, all of it!"
+
+Morley flinched, trying to throw off Bristow's hand. The lame man stepped
+back.
+
+"All right," he said, "I'm not going to hurt you."
+
+Morley, having yielded, told his story hurriedly, with little pauses here
+and there, struggling for breath.
+
+"I did miss my train, the midnight," he began. "I really tried to catch
+it. But, when I found it was gone, I couldn't sleep. I was worried and
+frightened. This bank business was on my mind. I wanted to think." He
+forced a mirthless smile at that. "I couldn't think very straight, but
+I tried to. I couldn't do anything but see myself in jail, in the
+penitentiary, because of the bank.
+
+"I wandered around without paying any attention to where I was. I'd left
+my bags in the station. The first thing I knew, I was on Manniston Road,
+in front of Number Nine--your house. I felt tired, and I sat down on the
+bottom step. I had on a raincoat. It--it was pitch-dark there.
+
+"The two electric lights, the street lights, on that block were out--had
+burnt out, or something. The only light I could see was down at the
+corner, where Manniston Road goes into Freeman Avenue--and that didn't
+give any light where I was."
+
+"That's true," Bristow said sharply, "but, from where you sat, anybody
+going up or down the steps of Number Five would have been directly
+between you and the avenue light. Isn't that so?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"All right--go ahead. What did you see?"
+
+Morley hitched back his chair still further. He had begun to perspire,
+and he kept running his fingers round his neck between flesh and collar.
+
+"It was raining," he went on, his voice strained and metallic, "a fine
+drizzle at that time, and this made a circle of light, a kind of bright
+screen around the avenue light. Things that happened on, or near, the
+steps of Number Five were silhouetted against that screen of light.
+
+"I'd been there just a little while when I noticed some kind of movement
+on the steps of Number Five. It was a man coming down the steps. He was
+very careful about it, and very slow; looked like a man on his tiptoes."
+
+Bristow maintained his attitude of hanging over him, urging him on,
+forcing him to talk. Braceway and Major Ross, their faces wearing
+strained expressions, bent forward in their chairs, catching every
+syllable that came from the prisoner.
+
+"He went down the steps and turned down Manniston Road, toward the
+avenue."
+
+"All right!" Bristow prompted. "What then?"
+
+"That was all there was to that. I just sat there. It looked funny to me,
+but I didn't follow him. I wondered what he'd been doing. I never thought
+about murder or--or anything like that. I swear I didn't!"
+
+He licked his lips and gulped.
+
+"I sat there, I don't know how much longer it was--pretty long, I
+suppose. I didn't keep my glance always toward Number Five.
+
+"When I did look that way again, I saw another man come down the steps
+quietly, very cautiously. He turned toward me, but he came only far
+enough up to cut in between Number Five and Number Seven. He disappeared
+that way, between the two houses."
+
+"Did you see the struggle?" Braceway asked sharply.
+
+Bristow scowled at the interruption.
+
+"What struggle?" Morley retorted, vacant eyes turned toward Braceway.
+
+"You know! The struggle between two men at the foot of the steps of
+Number Five."
+
+"I didn't see a struggle," said Morley. "There wasn't any."
+
+"You might as well tell it straight now as later. Give me the truth about
+that struggle. Were you in it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Now, see here! We know such a struggle occurred. If you were there, as
+you say you were, you must have seen it. You couldn't have helped seeing
+it!"
+
+Morley denied it again, and his denial stood against all of Braceway's
+skill. There had been no struggle, no encounter of any two persons. He
+clung to that without qualification.
+
+Bristow knew how great Braceway's disappointment was. He was convinced
+that Braceway, in coming to Washington, had looked forward to securing
+a confirmation of Withers' story. Now, instead of corroboration, he got
+only a flat and unshaken contradiction.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+ON THE RACK
+
+
+Braceway waved his hand carelessly, relinquishing the post of questioner.
+Bristow took command again.
+
+"What did you do after you saw the second man?"
+
+"At first, I sat still. After a while, not very long, it occurred to me
+that the two women in Number Five might be in danger. I say it occurred
+to me, but I didn't really think so.
+
+"I walked down to the bungalow, but I couldn't hear any noise, couldn't
+see any light. Finally, I went up to the head of the steps and listened,
+but there wasn't a sound. Then I went back to the hotel--no; I went first
+to the station, got my grips, and then went to the hotel."
+
+"Didn't murder or robbery occur to you when you saw those two men on the
+steps?"
+
+"Well--no; I can't say either occurred to me."
+
+"What did, then?"
+
+"I knew Withers had visited his wife unexpectedly once or twice before,
+late at night."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I don't know. I thought he was jealous, suspicious."
+
+"And you also thought these two men you saw were Withers?"
+
+"They might have been one man, the same man," Morley advanced the
+supposition wearily. The tremor of his hands had gone into his arms; they
+jerked every few moments. "I saw them at different times.
+
+"I couldn't see that clearly. But--but I think the first one wore a long
+raincoat, or else he was heavily built. Hearing about the negro the next
+day, I thought the first figure I'd seen must have been the negro's. The
+second didn't look very different. He might have had a beard; perhaps, he
+was a little slenderer. Those are the only differences I remember."
+
+"Did the second wear a raincoat?"
+
+"I thought so."
+
+"And the first had no beard?"
+
+"He might have, but I don't think so."
+
+Bristow paused long enough to let the silence become impressive. Then he
+broke the stillness with a voice that cracked sharp as a revolver shot.
+
+"Well! What about the struggle at the foot of the steps?"
+
+Morley, startled by the unexpected abruptness, answered shakily.
+
+"I tell you I--I didn't see any struggle. That man, or those men, tried
+not to make any noise at all. He thought nobody saw him."
+
+Braceway took a hand again in the examination, but their combined efforts
+got nothing further from the tired prisoner.
+
+They tried to shake him with the accusation that he had entered the
+bungalow Monday night; they told him also they might take him back to
+Furmville at once, charged with the murder.
+
+"It wouldn't make any difference to me," he said, making a weak attempt
+to laugh. "It wouldn't matter now. I'm not anxious to live anyhow."
+
+Without warning, utter collapse struck him. He flung himself half-around
+on his chair so that his arms rested on its back, cradling his face. His
+body was contorted by gasping sobs, and his feet tapped the floor with
+the rapidity of those of a man running at top speed.
+
+They left him with Major Ross. On the way back to the hotel, Bristow
+asked:
+
+"What about Withers' story of his struggle--the 'big, strong man' who
+flung him down the walk?"
+
+"There must have been another, a third man who came down the steps,"
+Braceway answered quietly.
+
+"An assumption," observed Bristow, "which rather strains my credulity."
+
+Braceway said nothing.
+
+"I believe," Bristow spoke up again, "what the fellow said tonight was
+true--substantially true."
+
+"Do you?" retorted Braceway, thoroughly non-committal.
+
+"Anyway there remains the problem of who pawned the Withers emeralds and
+diamonds this afternoon."
+
+"It may not be a problem," said Braceway. "It may be that they weren't
+the Withers stuff at all."
+
+"Ah! I hadn't thought of that."
+
+They entered the hotel and sat down in the lobby, now almost deserted.
+
+"I think," Bristow announced, careful to keep any note of triumph out of
+his voice, "I'll go back to Furmville in the morning." He yawned and
+stretched himself. "I'm about all in, weak as a kitten. What are you
+planning?"
+
+Braceway's chin was thrust forward. He looked belligerent, angry.
+
+"I'm going to Baltimore tomorrow. I intend to run down every clue I have
+or can find. I'm going to take up every statement he made tonight and
+dissect it--every point. I want all the facts--all of them."
+
+Bristow turned so as to face him squarely.
+
+"Why don't you go back with me? Why keep on fighting what I've proved?
+I think I know why you came to Washington. It wasn't your belief in
+Morley's guilt. It was your desire to clear Withers. But you know as well
+as I do that Withers isn't guilty. So, why worry?"
+
+Braceway sprang to his feet.
+
+"Morley isn't out of the woods yet," he said grimly. "This case isn't
+settled yet, by a long shot. I'm going to stick right here."
+
+He made no reference to Withers.
+
+Bristow went to his room, paid and dismissed Miss Martin, and began to
+undress. He was more than satisfied with everything that had happened.
+He had bested Braceway again, this time finally; his reputation as a
+"consulting detective" was more than safe; and, knowing now why Braceway
+had pursued Morley, he would return to Furmville in the morning, his mind
+thoroughly at ease.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+MISS FULTON WRITES A LETTER
+
+
+As long as the public's morbid curiosity clamoured for details of the
+case, the newspapers provided them lavishly. This curiosity was
+intensified by two things: first, the search for a murderer after so much
+almost convincing evidence had been found against the negro, and, second,
+the duel between Bristow, the amateur, and Braceway, the professional,
+each bent on making his theory "stand up." The amateur had achieved far
+more celebrity than he had expected.
+
+It would have been hard to find two men less alike than he and Braceway.
+Bristow was capable now and then of manifesting the strength and
+impressive authority he had exhibited in his questioning of Morley.
+Braceway, on the other hand, was always keyed up, dashing, imperious. And
+he had a kindness of heart, a very live tenderness, such as the lame man
+never displayed.
+
+Braceway was of the tribe of dreamers.
+
+He had learned that no man may hope to be a great detective unless he
+has imagination, unless he can throw into the dark places which always
+surround a mysterious crime the luminous and golden glow of fancy. He had
+found also that, if a man's vocabulary is without a "perhaps" or a "but
+why couldn't it be the other way?" he will never be able to judge human
+nature or to consider fairly every side of any question.
+
+He discussed these views at breakfast with Bristow, who was interested
+only in his own decision of the night before to return at once to
+Furmville.
+
+"My health demands it," he said; "and I can't convince myself that either
+you or I can dig up anything here to affect the final outcome of the
+case."
+
+"You're right about the health part of it; I'm not sure about the other,"
+said Braceway.
+
+"What are you after, though?" Bristow pressed him.
+
+"Facts. That bearded man with the gold tooth, the fellow who always
+started from nowhere and invariably vanished into thin air--I don't
+propose to assume that he had nothing to do with the murder of Enid
+Withers. I don't intend to be recorded as not having combed the country
+for him if necessary.
+
+"That disguised man is no myth. And Morley knows all about beard
+'make-up.' His note to me in Furmville proved that. The negro boy, Roddy,
+swears Morley and the mysterious stranger are the same.
+
+"There isn't a crook living who can put it over on me this way with a
+cheap disguise. And this case isn't cleared up until, in some way, I find
+out who he is or get my hands on him." His voice was vibrant with the
+intensity of his feeling. "I'm going to find him! I intend to answer, to
+my own satisfaction, two questions."
+
+"What are they?"
+
+"The first is: was the bearded man Morley? The second: if Morley wasn't
+the bearded man, who was?"
+
+"But, if you do find this hirsute individual, what then? What becomes of
+the unassailable evidence against the negro?"
+
+"That will come later. Today I'm going to Baltimore. I've a report
+already, this morning, from Platt. He went over there last night. Morley,
+I find, deceived us again last night. He said nothing of leaving the
+hotel to call on the lawyer, Taliaferro.
+
+"As a matter of fact, he did visit Taliaferro.
+
+"He called the lawyer on the telephone at twenty minutes past two and
+said he would go at once to his office. If he had done so, he would have
+arrived there at twenty-four minutes past two. He reached there, in fact,
+at two-fifty, ten minutes of three. A half-hour of his time isn't
+accounted for. He left the hotel at two-twenty-one. Where did he spend
+that last half-hour? It's an interesting point."
+
+"Yes," Bristow said, surprised. "Pawnshops?"
+
+"Perhaps--two pawnshops."
+
+"And the pawned diamonds and emeralds are certainly the Withers stuff, a
+part of it?"
+
+"I'm sure of it."
+
+"Anyway you look at it," Bristow smiled pleasantly, his manner tinged
+with patronizing, "you've a hard job to get away with."
+
+"If," the other ruminated, "the jewels pawned yesterday were not Mrs.
+Withers', why wouldn't the man who pawned them come forward and say so?
+If there wasn't anything crooked about them, why should he hide himself?
+The papers are full of it this morning. It's public property."
+
+Bristow, looking at his watch, saw that it was nine o'clock and time for
+him to go to the railroad station.
+
+They said good-bye, each confident that the other was on the wrong trail.
+
+"I'm leaving you," the lame man declared, "to run to your heart's content
+around the clever circles you've outlined, and to beat off the newspaper
+reporters."
+
+"It's not for long," Braceway returned seriously. "I hope to be in
+Furmville next week with an armful of new facts. I'll see you then."
+
+He went to the desk and got his mail. In addition to reports from his
+Atlanta office, there was one letter in a big, square envelope. He
+recognized the writing and opened that first.
+
+"Dear Mr. Braceway," it said: "I hope Mr. Bristow repeated to you
+everything I told him. He is quite brilliant, I have no doubt, but I
+talked to him in the belief and hope that he would tell you everything.
+I know what you can do, and I trust you more than I do him. You see, you
+have successes behind you.
+
+"If he did not tell you all, I shall be glad to do so at any time."
+
+It was signed, "Sincerely yours, Maria Fulton."
+
+He read the note twice. When he put it into his pocket, there was a new
+light in his eyes, and at the corners of his mouth a relaxation of the
+lines of sternness.
+
+"I wonder----" he began in his thoughts, and added: "Some other time,
+perhaps. No; surely. I always knew her better than she knew herself."
+
+He was frankly happy, felt himself uplifted, freshened in spirit.
+Standing there in the crowded lobby, with people brushing past him and
+jogging his elbow, he flashed back two years in memory to the evening
+when he had warned her not to let the sweetness of her personality be
+overshadowed by her sister. It was then that he had insisted on her
+living her own life instead of giving up to the wishes of others always.
+
+She had misconstrued it, deciding that he was disappointed in her. She
+said his love for her had lessened, and therefore their engagement was a
+great mistake.
+
+Then came her promise to marry Morley, a promise made in pique.
+Afterwards she had done everything possible to show the world she had
+chosen a man instead of a weakling. This, Braceway knew, was why she had
+advanced him money, bolstering up one mistake with another. It was why
+she had listened to his stories of getting great wealth, if only he had a
+small amount of money to start on!
+
+What a fiasco the whole thing had been, what bitter disappointment and
+sorrow! And yet, she had been fortunate in discovering now what he was.
+
+There was no doubt about it, Braceway decided; she had loved him,
+Braceway, all this time. In a few days he would tell her so, make her
+confess it. He would compel her to listen to what he had to say; he would
+never again jeopardize their happiness by allowing her to misunderstand
+him.
+
+He crossed the lobby with long, springy strides. He felt that he could
+encounter no obstacle too great for him to overcome. Failure could not
+touch him.
+
+He left the hotel and went to Golson's office. He had much to do in
+Baltimore--and elsewhere.
+
+Hurrying to the station after a brief conference with Golson, he wondered
+why he had heard nothing from Withers. What was the matter with George
+anyhow? Why hadn't he acknowledged the telegram of yesterday? Couldn't he
+realize, without being told, that he might be charged with the murder at
+any moment?
+
+Braceway was as well aware as Bristow of the rising flood of criticism
+against Withers.
+
+"If I can't bring things to a last show-down within a day or two," he
+looked the situation squarely in the face, "it will be uncomfortable for
+him--emphatically uncomfortable."
+
+He turned to a study of the questions he wanted to put to Eidstein, this
+kindly old merchant who was so considerate, so handsomely considerate,
+about buying back jewels he had once sold. Mr. Eidstein, he felt sure,
+must be an interesting character.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A MYSTIFYING TELEGRAM
+
+
+Reaching Furmville early Sunday morning, Bristow went straight to his
+bungalow, where Mattie had breakfast waiting for him.
+
+"You is sholy some big man now, Mistuh Bristow!" she informed him. "Sence
+you been gawn, folks done made it a habit to drive by hyuh jes' foh de
+chanct uv seem' you."
+
+Before the day was over, he found that this was true. And he liked it. He
+spent a great deal of his time on the front porch, finding it far from
+unpleasant to be regarded as a second Sherlock Holmes.
+
+Late in the afternoon his Cincinnati friend, Overton, called on him,
+puffing and gasping for breath as he climbed the steps. Bristow was glad
+to see him; it afforded him an opportunity to discuss his success. He did
+not try to delude himself in that regard; he was proud of what he had
+accomplished--rightfully proud, he told himself--and pleased with his
+plans for the future.
+
+"Gee whiz!" the fat man panted. "This hill is something fierce. It's only
+your sudden dash into the limelight that drags me up here."
+
+"You behold"--Bristow softened his statement with a deprecating
+laugh--"Mr. Lawrence Bristow, a finished, honest-to-heaven detective,
+a criminologist."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I'm going to make it my profession. I'm starting out as a professional
+detective."
+
+Overton burst into bubbling laughter.
+
+"That's rich!" he exclaimed. "You'd never in the world make good at it.
+Why, Bristow, you're lame; you've a crooked nose; that heavy, overhanging
+lip of yours--those things would enable any crook to spot you a mile
+off." He laughed again. "I'd like to see you shadowing some foxy
+second-story worker!"
+
+"I said 'a consulting detective'," Bristow corrected him. "That shadowing
+business is for the hired man, the square-toed, bull-necked cops. I'll
+work only as the directing head, the brains of the investigations."
+
+"Oh, that's different," said Overton, at once conciliatory. "That's
+nearer real sense. Big money in it, isn't there?"
+
+"Yes. I'm not an eleemosynary institution yet."
+
+Overton mopped his fat cheeks.
+
+"Ah, me!" he sighed. "We never know what's ahead of us, do we? A year ago
+you were dubbing around in Cincinnati trying to sell real estate and
+working out crime problems on paper--and here you are now, a big man.
+It's hard to believe."
+
+"It is, however, a very acceptable fact."
+
+"No doubt, no doubt," assented the fat man.
+
+On Overton's heels came the chief of police. After getting a minute
+recital of what had happened in Washington and Baltimore, he agreed that
+Braceway was only setting up straw men for the pleasure of knocking them
+down.
+
+"Even if there is something mysterious in Morley's conduct, in what
+occurred in Baltimore," said the chief, "it can't do away with the
+open-and-shut fact that Perry did the murder."
+
+"Of course," Bristow commented. "But what's the news with you?"
+
+"For one thing, Perry gave us last night what he calls a confession. In
+it he says he did tell Lucy Thomas he knew where he could get money 'or
+something just as good'; he did go to Number Five in a more or less
+drunken condition; and he got as far as the front door.
+
+"There, he says, he thought he heard a noise across the road from him,
+and he lost his nerve. He tiptoed down the steps and went away, passing
+in between Number Five and Number Seven. He ran all the way back to
+Lucy's house, threw down the key he had got from her, and then went
+to his own rooming-house. He says he stayed there the rest of the night."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"That's all."
+
+"How about the lavalliere? Wasn't it found under his window? The papers
+said so."
+
+"Yes; in the grass in the yard. But he denies knowing anything about it."
+
+"Of course! And his confession is nothing but a confirmation of the case
+against him."
+
+"Exactly. He seems to want to hang himself. And he'll do it. The grand
+jury meets next Thursday. He'll be indicted then, and tried two weeks
+later."
+
+"What are the people here saying about Braceway's bitterness against
+Morley? Anything?"
+
+"Yes. I'd meant to tell you about that. Some of the gossip hits Withers
+pretty hard. They can't understand what's behind this persecution of
+Morley after it's been proved that Perry did the murder. You've seen
+hints of it in the papers.
+
+"And it looks queer. Some say Withers is guilty, out-and-out guilty, and
+afraid the case against Perry won't hold good. So, they say, he wants to
+get a case against Morley."
+
+"A sort of second line of defense?"
+
+"I reckon so. But, then, there are others saying right now that Morley
+was mixed up in some sort of scandal for which Withers wants revenge.
+That's what you said at the very start. Remember?"
+
+Bristow laughed softly.
+
+"Yes; I had that idea, and I've reasoned it out. On the way to
+Washington, and after we got there, I saw that Braceway wasn't entirely
+frank with me. You know how a man can feel a thing like that. He gets it
+by intuition.
+
+"And it worried me. Having handled the case here, I didn't want him to
+spring some brand new angle which possibly, in some way, might make me
+look like a fool.
+
+"I puzzled over the thing a whole lot. What was it he was after without
+letting me in on it? The night we talked to Morley in the station house,
+I got it. We were in a cab at the time, a lucky thing, because, when it
+burst upon me, I narrowly escaped hysterics. The thing came to me like an
+inspiration.
+
+"Braceway was afraid Morley knew something detrimental to Withers and
+would spring it under questioning. Understand now: it wasn't directly
+connected with the murder, but something that would make it pretty hot
+for Withers. And here was the laugh: while Morley didn't know it, I did.
+Braceway had made the trip to gag Morley, to see that he didn't uncover
+something which, after all, Morley didn't know--and I did!
+
+"It was this: about nine months ago Mrs. Withers, while in Washington,
+got a lawyer, the firm of Dutton & Dutton, to draw up for her the
+necessary papers for suing Withers for a divorce. In these documents she
+set forth in so many words that her husband had treated her with the
+utmost brutality, so much so that she lived daily in danger of death
+while under his roof.
+
+"She regarded him, she swore, as capable of murdering her at any time.
+Now, do you see? If that had gotten into the newspapers, if Morley had
+known of it through Maria Fulton and had blurted it out, no power on
+earth could have kept down the very reasonable assumption that Withers
+had had a hand in his wife's death--or, at least, had regarded it with
+complaisance.
+
+"No wonder I laughed, was it? But I said nothing about it to Braceway. I
+couldn't have explained to him how I knew it, although the tip came to me
+straight enough. And, as there's no earthly chance of Withers having been
+implicated in the crime, why worry about it?
+
+"I merely laughed and--kept quiet."
+
+Greenleaf had listened in great solemnity to this amusing recital.
+
+"Maybe you're right," he said. "But Withers has done some funny things."
+
+"What things?"
+
+"His wife was buried in Atlanta Thursday morning. He immediately left
+Atlanta, and hasn't been seen or heard of since--a sharp contrast to old
+Fulton. He got back here early Friday morning and came up to Number Five.
+They're going to keep that bungalow."
+
+"When did Withers leave Atlanta?"
+
+"Thursday morning, right after the funeral. Another thing: he's heels
+over head in debt."
+
+"Well, what about it? What are you driving at?" Bristow asked,
+perceptibly irritable.
+
+"I'm not driving at anything. What's it to us anyway? It stimulates this
+ugly talk. That's all."
+
+Bristow was doing some quick thinking. If Withers had left Atlanta
+early Thursday morning, he might have reached Washington by Friday
+afternoon--and gone to Baltimore! But did he? And did Braceway know of it
+and keep it to himself?
+
+He recalled that Braceway, during their breakfast together in Washington,
+had said:
+
+"Get one thing straight in your mind, Bristow. Any man I find mixed up in
+this murder I'm going to turn over to the police. If I thought George
+Withers had killed his wife, I'd hand him over so fast it would make your
+head swim. You may not believe that, but I would--in a second!"
+
+Had that been a prophecy? Was Withers in Baltimore at two-thirty Friday
+afternoon? Could he have been fool enough to pawn anything? Or did he go
+there in the hope of incriminating Morley further? All these things were
+within the realm of possibility, but hardly credible. Braceway might have
+known of them, and he might not.
+
+Abrahamson, he remembered, had put it into Braceway's head, against
+Braceway's own desire, that the man with the gold tooth and Withers
+resembled each other. But nobody believed that. It would be futile to
+consider it.
+
+The chief, as if reading his thoughts, gave more information:
+
+"Abrahamson, the loan-shark, came to my office yesterday; wanted to know
+where he could reach Braceway by wire. He evidently knew something and
+wouldn't tell me. Said he wired yesterday morning to Braceway in
+Washington, but the telegraph company reported 'no delivery'--couldn't
+locate him. I wonder what the Jew knows."
+
+"It's too much for me." Bristow dismissed the question carelessly, but
+immediately flared up peevishly: "What's getting into these fellows? They
+act like fools, each of them, Morley and Withers, following Perry's lead
+and trying to have themselves arrested! But Braceway--if he wasn't in
+Washington, he must be on his way back here. We'll soon have his last say
+on the case."
+
+"All the same," said Greenleaf, "if I were in that husband's place, I'd
+stay away from here. The talk's too bitter; worse here among the
+Manniston Road people than anywhere else."
+
+"Well, what of it?"
+
+"It wouldn't be the first instance of how easy it is for an innocent man
+to be--well, hurt."
+
+"Oh, that sort of thing is out of the question, absurd."
+
+"Never mind! I'd stay away. That's what I'd do."
+
+It was almost dark when the chief of police took his departure. Bristow
+sat watching the last crimson light fade over the mountains. The dim
+electric, a poor excuse for a street lamp, had flashed on in front of
+No. 4. The shadows grew deeper and deeper; there was no breeze; the oaks
+along the roadside and in the backyards became still, black plumes above
+the bungalows.
+
+Manniston Road was wrapped in darkness. The silence was broken, even at
+this early hour, only by the distant, faint screech of street-car wheels
+against the rails, or the far sound of an automobile horn down in the
+town, or the rattle of a sick man's cough on one of the sleeping porches.
+There was something uncanny, Bristow thought, in the velvet blackness and
+the heavy silence.
+
+He got up and went into the living room, turning on the lights. The
+night, the stillness, had affected him. Perhaps, he thought, Withers
+after all would do well to give Furmville a wide berth. If disorganized
+rumour grew into positive accusation----
+
+And what of himself, Bristow? He had run down the guilty man, had
+discovered and hooked together the facts that made retribution almost an
+accomplished thing. Could he have been mistaken, entirely wrong? Would
+public opinion turn also against him and say he had enmeshed an innocent
+negro instead of bringing to punishment a jealousy-maddened husband?
+
+Was there a chance that, in condemning Withers, they would destroy his
+reputation for brilliant work?
+
+Pshaw! He shrugged his shoulders. He was worse than the gossiping women,
+letting himself conjure up weird and incredible ideas. There was not a
+weak place, not an illogical point, in the case he had disclosed against
+Carpenter. He had won. His prestige was assured. Far from questioning his
+work, they ought to thank him for----
+
+The reverie was interrupted by the telephone bell. He took down the
+receiver and shouted "Hello!" as if he resented the call. His irritation
+showed what a tremendous amount of nervous energy he had expended in the
+last six days.
+
+"Western Union speaking," said a man's voice. "Telegram for Mr. Lawrence
+Bristow, nine Manniston Road."
+
+"All right. This is Bristow. Read it to me."
+
+"Message is dated today, Washington, D. C.--'Mr. Lawrence Bristow, nine
+Manniston Road, Furmville, N. C. See Encyclopaedia Britannica, volume
+one, page five hundred and six, second column, line fifteen to line
+seventeen, and page five hundred and seven, second column, line seventeen
+to line twenty-three.' Signed 'S. S. Braceway,' Do you get that?"
+
+"No! Wait a minute," he called out sharply. "Let me get a pencil and take
+it down."
+
+He did so, verifying the numbers by having the operator repeat the
+message a third time. When he had hung up the receiver, he sat staring at
+what he had written. It was like so much Greek to him.
+
+"What's it all about?" he puzzled. "Is it one of Braceway's jokes?"
+
+Then he remembered that Braceway was not that kind of a joker. He looked
+at his watch. He had no encyclopaedia, and it was now a quarter to
+eleven, too late to ring up anybody and ask the absurd favour of having
+extracts from an encyclopaedia read to him over the telephone. Besides,
+it might be something he would prefer to keep to himself.
+
+He would wait until morning and go to the public library where he could
+look up the references with no questions asked. He was annoyed by the
+necessity of delay, angry with Braceway. He studied the numbers again,
+and allowed himself the rare luxury of an outburst of vari-coloured
+profanity.
+
+The idea uppermost in his mind was that the telegram had to do with
+Withers--or could it be something about Morley?
+
+In his bed on the sleeping porch, he looked out at the black plumes of
+the trees. The silence seemed now neither sinister nor oppressive. All
+that was sinister was in the past; had ended the night of the murder; and
+Carpenter would go to the chair for it--sure.
+
+And yet, if he were Withers, he would not come back to Manniston Road.
+Nobody could foresee what Braceway might imagine and exaggerate, even
+if it indicted and condemned his closest friend.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+WANTED: VENGEANCE
+
+
+But the next morning was the crowded beginning of the biggest day in
+Bristow's life, and the trip to the library was delayed. The hired
+automobile was waiting in front of No. 9 when a second telegram came,
+a bulky dispatch, scrawled with a pen across several pages. Dated from
+New Orleans, it read:
+
+  "Reward of five thousand dollars for discovery of my seven-year-old son
+   within next six days. Kidnapped last Friday night. No clue so far. Am
+   most anxious for your help. Will pay you two thousand dollars and
+   expenses and in addition to that will pay you the reward money if you
+   are successful. Will pay the two thousand whether you succeed or not.
+   City and state authorities will give you all the help needed. Come at
+   once if possible. Wire answer.
+
+  (Signed) "Emile Loutois."
+
+It was characteristic of Bristow that he was not particularly surprised
+or elated by the request for his services. It was the kind of thing he
+had foreseen as a result of the advertising he had received.
+
+He made his decision at once. For the past two days the Loutois
+kidnapping had commanded big space in the newspapers, and he was familiar
+with the story. Emile Loutois, Jr., young son of the wealthiest sugar
+planter in Louisiana, had been spirited away from the pavement in front
+of his home. It had been done at twilight with striking boldness, and no
+dependable trace of the kidnappers had been found.
+
+The delivery boy was waiting on the porch. Bristow typewrote his reply on
+a sheet of note paper:
+
+  "Terms accepted. Starting for New Orleans at once."
+
+On his way to the door, he stopped and reflected. He went back to the
+typewriter and sat down. He had not yet found out the real meaning of the
+Braceway message; and he did not propose to leave Furmville until he was
+assured that nothing could be done to blur the brightness of his work on
+the Withers case.
+
+He realized, and at the same time resented, the tribute he paid Braceway
+through his hesitancy. The man was a clever detective and, if left to
+dominate Greenleaf unopposed, might easily focus attention on a new
+theory of the crime. Not that this could result in the acquittal of the
+negro; but it might deprive him, Bristow, of the credit he was now given.
+
+Wouldn't it be well for him to stay in Furmville another twenty-four
+hours? There was Fulton; he wanted to learn how fully he approved of
+Braceway's refusal to accept the case against Perry Carpenter. Moreover,
+it seemed essential now that he discover the whereabouts of Withers. And
+twenty-four hours could hardly change anything in the kidnapping case.
+
+He tore up what he had written, and rattled off:
+
+  "Held here twenty-four hours longer by Withers case. Start to New
+   Orleans tomorrow morning. Terms accepted."
+
+As he handed it to the boy, he saw Mr. Fulton coming up the steps. He
+greeted the old gentleman with easy, smiling cordiality and pushed
+forward a chair for him, giving no sign of impatience at being delayed
+in his trip to the library.
+
+The simple dignity and strength of Fulton's bearing was even more
+impressive than it had been during their first talk. The lines were still
+deep in his face, but his eyes glowed splendidly, and this time, when he
+rested his hands on the chair-arms, they were steady.
+
+"I've come to beg news," he announced, his apologetic smile very winning.
+
+"Just what news?" returned Bristow. "I'll be glad to give you anything I
+can."
+
+"The real results of your trip; that's what I'd like to know about. I got
+no letter or telegram from Sam Braceway this morning; no report at all."
+
+Bristow told him the story in generous detail, concluding with his
+conviction that Morley, although a thorough scoundrel, was innocent of
+any hand in the murder.
+
+"I wish I could agree with you," said the old man. "I wish we all could
+satisfy our minds and take the evidence against the negro as final. But
+we can't. At least, I can't. I can't believe anything but that the
+disguised man, the one with the beard, is the one we've got to find."
+
+"You still think that man is Morley?"
+
+"I do--which reminds me. I came up here to tell you something I got from
+Maria, my daughter. She told me she had talked with you quite frankly.
+Well, she recalls that once she and this Morley were discussing the
+wearing of beards and moustaches; and he made this remark: 'One thing
+about a beard, it's the best disguise possible.'"
+
+"That is interesting, Mr. Fulton. Anything else?"
+
+"Yes. He had a good deal to say to that general effect. He said even a
+moustache, cleverly worn, changed a man's whole expression. That struck
+me at once, remembering that the jewels were pawned in Baltimore by a man
+who wore a moustache. Then, too, Morley said something about the value of
+eyebrows in a disguise, substituting bushy ones for thin ones, or vice
+versa. He had the whole business at his tongue's end."
+
+"He said all that, in what connection--crime?"
+
+"She can't recall that. She merely remembers he said it. I thought you'd
+like to know of it."
+
+"Of course. We can't have too many facts. By the way, sir, can you tell
+me where Mr. Withers is?"
+
+"In Atlanta."
+
+Seeing that he knew nothing of his son-in-law's disappearance, Bristow
+dropped the subject, and asked:
+
+"What is Miss Fulton's belief now? She still thinks Morley is the man?"
+
+The old man hitched his chair closer to Bristow's and lowered his voice.
+
+"She says a curious thing, Mr. Bristow. She declares that, if Morley
+isn't guilty, George Withers is."
+
+"And you?"
+
+"Oh, the talk about George is absurd."
+
+"But," urged Bristow, his smile persuasive, "for the sake of argument, if
+circumstances pointed to him as----"
+
+"I'd spend every dollar I have, use the last atom of my strength, to send
+him to the chair! No suffering, no torture, would be too much for him--if
+that's what you mean to ask me. If I even suspected him, I'd subject him
+to an inquiry more relentless, more searching, more merciless than I'd
+use with anybody else!"
+
+His nostrils expanded curiously. His eyes flamed.
+
+"Mr. Bristow," he continued, menace in his low tone, "no punishment ever
+devised by man could be sufficient to pay for, to atone for, the horror,
+the enormity, of the destruction of such a woman as my daughter was.
+Mercy? I'd show him no mercy if he lived a thousand years!"
+
+"I understand your feeling," Bristow said. "You're perfectly right, of
+course. And what I was leading up to is this: although we know that the
+idea of Withers' guilt is absurd, he's being made to suffer. You've seen
+intimations, almost direct statements, in the newspapers. People are
+talking disagreeably.
+
+"They're saying that Braceway, employed by you and Withers, is
+persecuting this bank thief in the hope of building up the murder charge,
+so that, if the case against Carpenter falls down, Morley will be the
+logical man to be put on trial. You see?"
+
+"No," Fulton said; "I don't. What do you mean?"
+
+"That you, Withers, and Braceway are afraid Withers may be accused of the
+murder."
+
+"Ah! They're saying that, are they? And you were going to say--what?"
+
+"Simply this: the negro's the guilty man. The facts speak for themselves,
+and facts are incontrovertible. As surely as the sun shines, Carpenter
+killed your daughter. Why, then, continue this gossip, slander which
+besmirches Withers and is bound to attack your daughter's name?"
+
+"What do you mean? Be a little more specific, please."
+
+"I mean: what do you and Withers gain by letting Braceway keep this thing
+before the public?"
+
+Fulton leaned far forward in his chair, his lower lip thrust out, his
+eyes blazing.
+
+"No, sir!" he exploded. "I'll never call Braceway off! They're gossiping,
+are they? They can gossip until they're blue in the face. What do I
+care for public opinion, for gossip, for their leers and whispers?
+Nothing--not a snap of the finger! To hell with what they say! What
+I want is vengeance. I'll have it! Call Braceway off? Not while there's
+breath in me!"
+
+He paused and bit on his lip.
+
+"Understand me, Mr. Bristow," he continued, his tone more moderate. "I
+meant no criticism of you; I know how faithfully you've worked. I realize
+even that you have proved your case. But I can't accept it, that's all.
+You'll forgive an old man's temper."
+
+Bristow carried the argument no further. He saw that Fulton, and Withers
+too, would follow Braceway's lead. Consequently, he was confronted with
+the necessity of keeping up the idiotic duel with the Atlanta detective.
+
+Moreover, he sensed the viewpoint of the dead woman's family. They were
+averse to believing she had been the victim of an ordinary negro burglar.
+Remembering her beauty and charm, her cleverness and lovable qualities,
+they preferred to think that some one under great emotion, or with a
+terrific gift for crime, had cut short her brilliant existence.
+
+People, he meditated, find foolish and bizarre means of comforting
+themselves when overwhelmed by great tragedy. Very well, then; let it go
+at that. After all, it was not his funeral.
+
+Accompanying Fulton to the sidewalk, he climbed into the automobile and,
+in a few minutes, was in the library asking for the first volume of the
+last edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His limp proclaimed his
+identity, and the young woman at the desk, recognizing him, got the book
+for him with surprising promptness.
+
+His habits of thought were such that he had not wasted energy during
+the morning in idle speculation as to what he would find. In fact, he
+attached but little importance to Braceway's message. He had dismissed it
+the night before as a queer dodge on the other's part to bolster up his
+view of the case.
+
+He went to a desk in a remote part of the reading room. Under any
+circumstances, he would not have cared for the intense and interested
+scrutiny with which the girl at the desk favoured him. The attitude he
+took gave her ample opportunity for a study of the back of his head.
+
+Opening the volume, he turned to the first reference, page 506, column 2,
+line 15 to line 17. At the first word he drew a quick breath; it was
+sharp enough to sound like a low whistle. He read:
+
+"ALBINO, a biological term (Lat. _albus_, white), in the usual
+acceptation, for a pigmentless individual of a normally pigmented race."
+
+Putting his finger on the top of the second column, page 507, he counted
+down to line 17, and read:
+
+"Albinism occurs in all races of mankind, among mountainous as well as
+lowland dwellers. And, with man, as with other animals, it may be
+complete or partial. Instances of the latter condition are very common
+among the negroes of the United States and of South America, and in them
+assumes a piebald character, irregular white patches being scattered over
+the general black surface of the body."
+
+Before he began to think, he read the passages carefully a second time.
+Then he continued to hold the book open, staring at it as if he still
+read.
+
+The importance of the words struck him immediately. He grasped their
+meaning as quickly and as fully as he would have done if Braceway had
+stood beside him and explained. The skin of a white person and that of an
+albino show up the same under a microscope: white. If a man had under his
+finger nails particles of white skin, he could have collected them there
+by scratching an albino as well as by scratching a Caucasian, a white
+woman.
+
+And Lucy Thomas was an albino. He was certain of that; did not question
+it for a moment. Braceway had assured himself of that before sending
+the telegram.
+
+Perry Carpenter had had a fight or a tussle with her in securing the key
+to No. 5 the night of the murder, and in the scoffling he had scratched
+her. That, at least, would be Perry's story and Lucy's. Braceway had been
+certain of that also before wiring to him.
+
+As a matter of fact, Braceway had known all this before they had started
+for Washington and had kept it back, playing with him, laughing up his
+sleeve. The thought nettled him, finally made him thoroughly angry. He
+compelled himself to weigh the new situation carefully.
+
+Well, what of it, even if Lucy were an albino and Perry had scratched
+her? Did that affect materially the case against Perry? There was still
+evidence to prove that he had been to the Withers' bungalow. He had
+confessed it himself. And the lavalliere incidents and the blouse buttons
+substantiated it still further.
+
+The albino argument was by no means final, could not be made definite.
+The fact remained that there had been scratches on the murdered woman's
+hand and that particles of a white person's skin had been found under
+Perry's finger nails. That was not to be denied. Of course, the negro's
+attorney could argue that these particles had come from Lucy Thomas, not
+from Mrs. Withers.
+
+But it would be only an argument. The jury would pass judgment on it--and
+he was willing to leave it to the jury.
+
+He closed the book, took it back to the desk and thanked the young woman.
+There was nothing in his appearance to indicate disappointment. In fact,
+he felt none. By the time he reached home he had gone over the whole
+thing once more and dismissed it as of no real consequence. Braceway's
+discovery, or his making the discovery known, had come too late.
+
+If it had been brought out ahead of Perry's confession--yes; it would
+have made quite a difference then.
+
+"Let the heathen rage!" he thought, remembering the bitter stubbornness
+with which Braceway and Fulton denied the negro's guilt.
+
+Braceway's withholding the albino information, playing him for a fool,
+recurred to him, and the accustomed flush on his cheeks grew deeper. He
+would not forget that; he would pay it back--with interest.
+
+He turned to the Loutois case. Going to his typewriter, he made a list of
+New Orleans, Atlanta, and New York newspapers.
+
+"Mattie," he called, "_I_ want you to go down to a news-stand, the big
+one; I think it's at the corner of Haywood and Patton."
+
+He handed her money.
+
+"And here's a list of the papers you're to get. Ask for all of them
+published since last Friday. Be as quick as you can. I'm in a hurry."
+
+When she came back, she brought also the early edition of the Furmville
+afternoon paper. He glanced at it, looking for Washington or Baltimore
+news of Braceway's activities. He found it on the front page. The
+headlines read:
+
+     FINDS NEW EVIDENCE
+     ON WITHERS MURDER
+
+     MORLEY GUILTY, OR--WHO?
+
+     Whereabouts of Murdered Woman's Husband
+     Not Known--Braceway Predicts New
+     and Amazing Disclosure.
+
+The dispatch itself was:
+
+  "Washington, D. C., May 14.--That an entirely new light will soon be
+   thrown on the brutal murder of Mrs. Enid Fulton Withers, beauty and
+   society favourite of Atlanta and Washington, became known here today.
+
+  "Samuel S. Braceway, probably the ablest private detective in this
+   country, left this city yesterday afternoon for Furmville, N. C., the
+   scene of the crime, after he had completed an exhaustive investigation
+   here and in Baltimore of more or less obscure matters related to the
+   murder. Police officials here state that the negro, Perry Carpenter,
+   now held in the Furmville jail for the crime, will never go to trial.
+
+  "This, they claim, will be but one result of the work Braceway did here
+   and in Baltimore. The detective himself was reticent when interviewed
+   just before he caught his train, but, as he stood on the platform,
+   nobbily dressed and twirling his walking stick, he was the picture of
+   confidence.
+
+  "'I think you're safe in saying,' he admitted 'that the Withers case
+   hasn't yet been settled. We're due for some surprising disclosures
+   unless I miss my guess.'
+
+  "'Can you tell us anything about the suspicions directed against Henry
+   Morley?' he was asked.
+
+  "'It's Morley or--somebody else,' Braceway said smilingly. 'Anybody can
+   study the facts and satisfy himself on that point.'
+
+  "'Who's the somebody else?'
+
+  "'We'll know pretty soon. In fact, things should develop in less than a
+   week, considerably less than a week.'
+
+  "One of the interesting sidelights on this mysterious murder case, it
+   was learned this morning, is that the whereabouts of the murdered
+   woman's husband, George S. Withers of Atlanta, is at present unknown.
+   Dispatches from Atlanta say he disappeared from there the morning his
+   wife's funeral took place. Advices from Furmville are that he is not
+   there with his father-in-law and sister-in-law. Braceway said
+   yesterday he knew nothing of Withers' whereabouts."
+
+Beneath the Washington dispatch was one from Atlanta:
+
+  "Inquiry made here today failed to disclose where George S. Withers,
+   husband of the victim of the brutal crime at Furmville, N. C., is now.
+   He left this city the morning Mrs. Withers was buried, according to
+   his friends, but said nothing as to his destination or the probable
+   length of time he would be away.
+
+  "The Atlanta authorities were asked by the Washington police to locate
+   him if possible. No reason for the request was given."
+
+There was a smile on Bristow's lips when he tossed the paper to one side.
+Braceway, he deduced from the article, was having his troubles making the
+Morley theory hang together. And why should he hurry back to Furmville?
+There was nothing new here.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders and unwrapped the bundle of out-of-town papers.
+
+Recalling how late he had received the albino message the night before,
+he concluded that Braceway had filed it in Washington during the
+afternoon, with instructions that it be sent as a night message. His
+resentment for Braceway flared up again.
+
+"'Amazing disclosure,'" he mentally quoted the headlines. "Well, we shall
+see what we shall see. Perhaps, it will come as an amazing disclosure to
+him that I've been on the sound side of this question all along."
+
+He began the work of cutting from the papers the accounts of the Loutois
+kidnapping. As he read them, he built up a tentative outline showing
+who the kidnappers were and where they probably had secreted the boy. He
+grew absorbed, whistling in a low key.
+
+So far as he was concerned, the Withers case was a closed incident.
+
+Early in the afternoon he called Greenleaf on the telephone, and
+announced:
+
+"I'm leaving town for a few days tomorrow morning."
+
+"Again! What for?" the chief asked.
+
+"They've asked me to work out that kidnapping case in New Orleans--the
+Loutois child."
+
+"Good! I'm glad to hear it; I congratulate you."
+
+Greenleaf was sincerely pleased. He felt that he had sponsored and
+developed the lame man as a detective.
+
+"Thanks. Before I go, I want to have a talk with you. We might as well go
+over everything once more and----"
+
+"That reminds me. I was just about to call you up, but your news made me
+forget. I've a wire from Braceway, just got it. He filed it at Salisbury,
+on his way here. Let me read it to you:
+
+  "'Have all the stuff I can get on Withers case. Can not go further
+   before conferring with you, Bristow, Fulton, and Abrahamson. Please
+   arrange meeting of all these Bristow's bungalow eight tonight. Withers
+   not with me.'"
+
+"That fits in," Bristow commented; "lets me start for New Orleans on the
+late night train."
+
+"Wonder what he's got," the chief questioned. "Do you know?"
+
+"No. And I don't believe it amounts to anything. Still, if he wants to
+talk, we might as well hear it."
+
+"Sure! You can count on me. I'll be there."
+
+"All right," said Bristow. "I'll see you at eight, then."
+
+He went to the sleeping porch and lay down.
+
+"'Withers not with me,'" the last words of the telegram lingered in his
+mind. "Why did he add that? What's that to do with a conference here
+tonight?"
+
+Suddenly the answer occurred to him.
+
+"It's Withers!" he thought, at first only half-credulous. "He's going to
+put it on Withers; he's going to try to put it on Withers."
+
+He paused, thinking "wild" for a moment, so great was his surprise.
+
+"It was Withers he was after from the start,--was it?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+THE REVELATION
+
+
+Braceway and Maria Fulton had upon their faces that expression which
+announces a happy understanding between lovers. The light of surrender
+was in her eyes, contented surrender to the man who, because of his love,
+had asserted his mastery of her. And his voice, as he spoke to her, was
+all a vibrant tenderness. He realized that he had found and finally made
+certain his happiness, had done so at the very moment of making public
+his greatest professional triumph.
+
+For his visit to her he had stolen a half-hour from the rush of work that
+had devolved upon him since reaching Furmville a few hours ago. He found
+her as he had expected; she fulfilled his prophecy that, in following her
+own ideals, she would take her place in the world as a fascinating
+personality, a lovable woman.
+
+But, while he studied and praised her new charm, he was conscious, more
+keenly so than ever before, that his success would affect her greatly,
+would challenge all her strength and courage. And yet, even if it hurt
+her, it had to be done. It was his duty, and the consequences would have
+to take care of themselves.
+
+Although, in her turn, she regarded him with the fine intuition of the
+woman who loves, she got no intimation of his worry. He had determined
+not to burden her with the details in advance. If what he was about to do
+should link her dead sister with a pitiless scandal, she would meet it
+bravely.
+
+Unless he had been confident of that, he could not have loved her. His
+task was to hand over to justice the guilty man, and not even his concern
+for the woman he would marry could interfere with his seeing the thing
+through.
+
+After it was all over, he would come back to comfort her. Their new
+happiness would counter-balance all. So he thought, with confidence.
+
+A glance through the window showed him Greenleaf and Abrahamson coming
+slowly up Manniston Road. It was eight o'clock. A few moments later he
+and Mr. Fulton joined them on the sidewalk. They went at once to No. 9.
+
+Bristow received them in his living room, the table still littered with
+newspaper clippings on the Loutois kidnapping.
+
+"If the rest of you don't mind," Braceway suggested, "we'd better close
+the windows. We've a lot of talking to do, and we might as well keep
+things to ourselves."
+
+The effect of alertness which he always produced was more evident now
+than ever. He kept his cane and himself in continual motion. While the
+four other men seated themselves, he remained standing, facing them, his
+back to the empty fire-place.
+
+"Each of you," he said, "is vitally interested in what I've come here to
+say. I asked you to have this conference because it affects each of us
+directly."
+
+His eyes shone, his chin was thrust forward, every ligament in his body
+was strung taut. And yet, there was nothing of the theatric about him.
+If he felt excitement, it was suppressed. Determination was the only
+emotion of which he gave any sign.
+
+"First, however," he supplemented in his light, conversational tone, "how
+about you?" He indicated with a look Greenleaf and Bristow. "Have you
+anything new, anything additional?"
+
+With the windows shut, it was noticeably warm and close in the room.
+Taking off his coat, he tossed it to the chair which had been placed for
+him. In his white shirt, with dark trousers belted tightly over slender
+hips, he looked almost boyish.
+
+"No," Bristow answered. "The chief and I went over everything yesterday.
+We couldn't find a single reason for changing our minds."
+
+"About Carpenter?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You mean that's your position, yours and the chiefs," Braceway said
+seriously. "As a matter of fact, the negro's not guilty."
+
+"You mean that's your position," Bristow quoted back to him, his smile
+indulgent.
+
+"Yes. Carpenter's not guilty, and Morley's not guilty."
+
+Mr. Fulton, who had the chair immediately on the lame man's left, was
+frankly curious and anxious.
+
+"Before you go any further, Braceway," he interrupted testily, "can you
+tell us where George Withers is?"
+
+"I can say this much," replied Braceway after a pause: "for reasons best
+known to himself, Withers refused to join us here. He could have done so
+if he had wished."
+
+What he said sounded like a direct accusation of Withers. Fulton eyed him
+incredulously. Bristow took off his coat and settled himself more
+comfortably in his chair; he was in for a long story, he thought, and, as
+he had expected last night, the dead woman's husband, not Morley, was to
+be incriminated.
+
+Greenleaf, lolling back in a rocker near the folding doors of the dining
+room, gazed at the ceiling, making a show of lack of interest.
+
+Abrahamson, nearest the porch door, was the only auditor thoroughly
+absorbed in the detective's story and at the same time unreservedly
+credulous.
+
+"But you know where he is?" Fulton persisted.
+
+"Yes; approximately."
+
+The Jew's sparkling eyes darted from the speaker to the faces of the
+others. A pleased smile lifted the corners of his mouth toward the great,
+hooked nose. He anticipated unusually pleasant entertainment.
+
+"But I don't want to waste your time," Braceway continued, taking
+peculiar care in his choice of words. "When I began work on this case,
+I thought either the negro or Morley might be the murderer. I changed
+my mind when I came to think about the mysterious fellow, the man with
+the brown beard and the gold tooth, the individual who was clever enough
+to appear and disappear at will, to vanish without leaving a trace so
+long as he operated at night or in the dusk of early evening.
+
+"I agreed with Mr. Fulton that he was the murderer. Not only that, but he
+had remarkable ability which he employed for the lowest and most criminal
+purposes. I first suspected his identity right after my interviews last
+Wednesday with Roddy, the coloured bellboy, and Mr. Abrahamson, the pawn
+broker."
+
+"Excuse me," Bristow interposed; "but wasn't it Abrahamson who told you
+the bearded man looked like Withers?"
+
+Greenleaf grinned, appreciating the lame man's intention to take the wind
+out of Braceway's sails by giving credit to Abrahamson for the
+information.
+
+"Yes, he told me that," Braceway answered, as if nettled by the
+interruption; and added: "Let me finish my statement, Bristow. You can
+discuss it all you please later on. But I'd prefer to get through with it
+now.
+
+"Having suspected the identity of the disguised man, I was confronted
+with two jobs. One was to prove the identity beyond question; the other
+was to show, by irrefutable evidence, that the disguised man committed
+the murder. As I said, my theory took shape in my mind that afternoon in
+my room in the Brevord Hotel. Everything I've done since then, has been
+for the purpose of getting the necessary facts.
+
+"I have those facts now."
+
+He looked at Greenleaf and Bristow, making it plain that he expected
+their hostility to anything he had to say.
+
+"My suspicion grew out of my belief that I must find the man who had
+blackmailed Mrs. Withers in Atlantic City and Washington, and, for the
+third time, here in Furmville. The blackmailer was the only one who had
+had access to the victim on the three different occasions of which we
+know; the work was all by the same hand. Find the blackmailer, and I had
+the murderer.
+
+"I know now who he is.
+
+"Five years ago there was a striking sort of individuality that had
+impressed itself on the minds of a good many men in Wall Street, New York
+City. Although penniless at the outset of his career, and in fact never
+really rich, he had made a good deal of money now and then; and had spent
+it as fast as he got it.
+
+"He was brilliant, thoroughly unscrupulous, absolutely without honour. He
+did the 'Great White Way' stunt--the restaurants, the roof gardens, a
+pretty actress at times, jewels and champagne. Because of his uncertain
+habits, he never had an office of his own. He always operated through
+others. His earning power was a gift of judging the market and knowing
+when to 'bear' and when to 'bull.'
+
+"This gift was no fabulous thing. It was real in a majority of the times
+he tried to use it, and because of it he was able to live high and put up
+a good front. This was the situation up to five years ago. Observe the
+man's character and the pleasure he took in running crooked.
+
+"With a little study and the usual amount of industry and concentration,
+he could have been a power in the financial world. That, however, did
+not appeal to him. He liked the excitement of crime, the perverted
+pleasure of playing the crook.
+
+"Early in nineteen-thirteen, a little more than five years ago, the crash
+came. He was arrested, charged with the embezzlement of thirty-three
+hundred dollars from the firm which employed him. The name of the firm
+was Blanchard and Sebastian. He had stolen more than the amount
+mentioned, but the specific charge on which action was taken was the
+theft of the thirty-three hundred.
+
+"This man's name was Splain.
+
+"There was a delay of a few hours in arranging for his bail so that he
+wouldn't have to spend the night in prison. While in his cell, he
+remarked:
+
+"'This kind of a place doesn't suit me. It's as cold as charity. I'll be
+out of here in an hour or so, and, if they ever get me into a cell again,
+they'll have to kill me first. Once is enough.'
+
+"He made good his boast. They didn't get him into one again. He jumped
+his bail ten days before the date set for his trial. Since then the
+police have, so far as they know, never laid eyes on him. They had a
+photograph of him, of course, an adequate description: high aquiline
+nose; firm, compressed mouth; black and unusually piercing eyes; black
+hair; all his features sharp-cut; broad shoulders, and slender, athletic
+figure. Those are some of the details I recall. In----"
+
+Fulton cried out. It was like the shrill, indefinite protest of a child
+against pain. He put the fingers of his right hand to his forehead,
+shielding his face. The description of the fugitive had brought instantly
+to his mind the face of George Withers.
+
+"Indulge me for just a few moments more, Mr. Fulton," Braceway said.
+"Splain eluded the pursuit. His flight and disappearance were perfectly
+planned and carried out, and----"
+
+Bristow again interrupted the recital. On his face was a smile which did
+not reach to his eyes. For the past few minutes he had been thinking
+faster than he had ever thought in his life, and had made a decision.
+
+"What you've told us," he said calmly, his gaze taking knowledge of no
+one but the detective, "is, in effect, a rather flattering sketch of a
+part of my own life."
+
+Greenleaf, with jaw dropped and thinking powers paralyzed, stared at him.
+Fulton leaned forward as if to spring.
+
+Only Abrahamson, his smile broadening, his cavernous eyes alight, was
+free from surprise. He had now the air of greatly enjoying the
+performance he had been invited to see.
+
+Braceway, his shoulders flung back, his figure straight as a poplar,
+watching Bristow with intense caution, grew suddenly into heroic mould.
+The red glow from the setting sun streamed through the window to his
+face, emphasizing the ardour in his eyes. He took a step forward, became
+dominant, menacing.
+
+His white-clad arm shot out so that he pointed with accusing finger to
+the imperturbable Bristow.
+
+"That man there," he declared, a crawling contempt in his voice, "is the
+thief and the murderer!"
+
+For a heavy moment the incredible accusation stunned the entire group.
+
+"Mr. Braceway," said Bristow, looking now at Fulton and Greenleaf, "is
+suffering a delusion."
+
+The two men, however, afforded him no support. They kept their eyes on
+Braceway. They gave the effect of falling away from some evil contagion.
+
+"Because," Bristow continued, "I have been the innocent victim of trumped
+up charges of embezzlement by the crookedest man in a crooked business,
+he accuses me of murder when----"
+
+"Shut up!" commanded Braceway, dropping his hand to his side.
+
+He flashed the pawn broker a quick glance.
+
+Abrahamson leaned over and rapped with his knuckles on the door to the
+porch. It opened, admitting two policemen in uniform.
+
+"I took the liberty, chief," Braceway apologized, "of requesting them to
+be here. I knew you'd want them to do the right thing, and promptly."
+
+Greenleaf gulped, nodded acquiescence. Stunned as he was, the detective's
+manner forced him into believing the charge.
+
+Bristow's smile had faded. But, save for a pallor that wiped from his
+checks their usual flush, there was no evidence of the conflict within
+him. So far as any notice from him went, the policemen did not exist.
+
+One of them stepped forward and laid a hand on his shoulder.
+
+He ignored it
+
+"Perhaps," he said, sarcasm in his voice, his eyes again on Braceway,
+"it will occur to you that I've a right to know why this outrage is
+committed."
+
+Once more he commanded Greenleaf with his eyes.
+
+"The chief of police will hardly sanction it without some excuse, without
+a shadow of evidence."
+
+"Yes," Greenleaf complied waveringly. "Er--, that is--er--I suppose
+you're certain about this, Mr. Braceway?"
+
+"Let's have it! Let's have it all!" demanded Fulton, articulate at last,
+his clenched hands shaken by the palsy of rage.
+
+Bristow, with a careless motion, brushed away the policeman's hand.
+
+"By all means," he said, imperturbable still; "I demand it. I'm not
+guilty of murder. Not by the wildest flight of the craziest fancy can any
+such charge be substantiated."
+
+Greenleaf, noting his iron nerve, his freedom from the slightest sign of
+panic, was dumbfounded, and believed in his innocence again.
+
+"I have the proofs," Braceway said to the chief. "Do you want them here,
+and now?"
+
+"It might be--er--as well, and--and fair, you know. Yes."
+
+Abrahamson swung the porch door shut. The two policemen stood back of
+Bristow's chair. Greenleaf, still bewildered, laid a calming hand on
+Fulton's shoulder. The old man was shaking like a leaf.
+
+"All right," agreed Braceway. "I can give you the important points in a
+very few minutes; the high lights."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+CONFESSION VOLUNTARY
+
+
+Braceway leaned against the mantel, relaxed, swinging his cane slowly in
+his right hand, a careless, easy grace in his attitude. He addressed
+himself to Fulton and Greenleaf, an occasional glance including
+Abrahamson in the circle of those for whose benefit he spoke.
+
+Bristow listened now in unfeigned absorption, estimating every statement,
+weighing each detail. The tenseness of his pale face showed how he forced
+his brain to concentration.
+
+"Having decided that the bearded man and the murderer were the same,"
+Braceway began, "I asked myself this question: 'Who, of all those in
+Furmville, is so connected with the case now that I am warranted in
+thinking he did the previous blackmailing and this murder?' And I
+eliminated in my own mind everybody but Lawrence Bristow. He was the one,
+the only one, who could have annoyed Mrs. Withers one and four years ago,
+respectively, and also could have murdered her.
+
+"Morley was at once out of the reckoning; he had known the Fultons for
+only the past three years. To consider the negro, Perry Carpenter, would
+have been absurd. Withers, of course, was beyond suspicion. Everything
+pointed to Bristow.
+
+"With that decision last Wednesday afternoon, I went to Number Five and
+got all the finger-prints visible on the polished surfaces of the chair
+which was handled, overturned, in the living room the night of the
+murder. Fortunately, this polish was inferior enough to have been made
+gummy by the rain and dampness that night; and, in the stress of the few
+days following, had been neither dusted nor wiped off.
+
+"Bristow did not touch this chair the morning the murder was discovered.
+In fact, he cautioned everybody not to touch it.
+
+"Reliable witnesses say he didn't touch it between then and the time I
+got the finger-prints. He declares he was never in the bungalow before he
+entered it in response to Miss Fulton's cry for help.
+
+"I found on the chair the finger-prints of five different persons, four
+afterwards identified: Miss Fulton, the coroner, Miss Kelly and Lucy
+Thomas. The fifth I was unable to check up then.
+
+"I did so later, in Washington.
+
+"It was identical with the print of Bristow's fingers on the glass top of
+a table in his hotel room there. I didn't depend on my own judgment for
+that. I had with me an expert on finger-prints. And finger-prints, as you
+all know, never lie.
+
+"All this established the fact, beyond question, that Bristow had been
+secretly in the living room of Number Five before, or at the time of, the
+commission of the crime."
+
+He paused, giving them time to appreciate the full import of that chain
+of facts.
+
+For the space of half a minute, the room was a study in still life. The
+sound of Fulton's grating teeth was distinctly audible. Bristow made a
+quick move, as if to speak, but checked the impulse.
+
+"In Washington," Braceway resumed, "he had the hemorrhage. It was
+faked--a red-ink hemorrhage. Before the arrival of the physician who was
+summoned, Bristow had ordered a bellboy to wrap the 'blood-stained'
+handkerchief and towel in a larger and thicker towel and to have the
+whole bundle burned at once.
+
+"This, he explained to the boy, was because of his desire that nobody be
+put in danger of contracting tuberculosis.
+
+"By bribing the porter who had been directed to do the burning, I got a
+look at both the handkerchief and the towel. They were soaked right
+enough, thoroughly soaked--in the red ink.
+
+"The physician was easily deceived because, when he came in, all traces
+of the so-called blood had been obliterated. Altogether, it was a clever
+trick on Bristow's part.
+
+"His motive for staging it and for arranging for a long and uninterrupted
+sleep was clear enough. There was something he wanted to do unobserved,
+something so vital to him that he was willing to take an immense amount
+of trouble with it. Golson's detective bureau let me have the best
+trailer, the smoothest 'shadow,' in the business--Tom Ricketts.
+
+"At my direction he followed Bristow from the Willard Hotel to the
+electric car leaving Washington for Baltimore at one o'clock. Reaching
+Baltimore at two-thirty, Bristow pawned the emeralds and diamonds at two
+pawnshops. He caught the four o'clock electric car back to Washington,
+and was in his room long before six, the hour at which his nurse, Miss
+Martin, was to wake him.
+
+"On the Baltimore trip he had a left leg as sound as mine and wore no
+brace of any kind. He did wear a moustache, and bushy eyebrows, which
+changed his appearance tremendously. Also, he had changed the outline of
+his face and the shape of his lips.
+
+"While he was in Baltimore, I searched the bedroom in which he was
+supposed to be asleep.
+
+"Miss Martin, in whom I had been obliged to confide, helped me. We found
+in the two-inch sole of the left shoe, which of course he did not take
+with him, a hollow place, a very serviceable receptacle. In it was the
+bulk of the missing Withers jewelry, the stones unset, pried from their
+gold and platinum settings.
+
+"They are, I dare say, there now."
+
+The two policemen stared wide-eyed at Bristow. He was, they decided, the
+"slickest" man they had ever seen.
+
+"You see why he executed the trick? It was to establish forever, beyond
+the possibility of question, his innocence. Plainly, if an unknown man
+pawned the Withers jewelry in Baltimore while Bristow slept, exhausted by
+a major hemorrhage, in Washington, his case was made good, his alibi
+perfect.
+
+"You can appreciate now how he built up his fake case against Perry
+Carpenter, his use of the buttons, his creeping about at night, like a
+villain in cheap melodrama, dropping pieces of the jewelry where they
+would incriminate the negro most surely, and his exploitation of the
+'winning clue,' the finger nail evidence.
+
+"Furthermore, he gave Lucy Thomas a frightful beating to force from her
+the statement against Perry. In this, he was brutal beyond belief. I saw
+that same afternoon the marks of his blows on her shoulders. They were
+sufficient proofs of his capacity for unbridled rage. The sight of them
+strengthened my conviction that, in a similar mood, he had murdered Mrs.
+Withers."
+
+"The negro lied!" Bristow broke in at last, his words a little fast
+despite his surface equanimity. "I subjected her to no ill treatment
+whatever. Anyway"--he dismissed it with a wave of his hand--"it's a minor
+detail."
+
+Braceway, without so much as a glance at him, continued:
+
+"And that gave me my knowledge of her being a partial albino. She has
+patches of white skin across her shoulders, and Perry, in struggling with
+her for possession of the key to Number Five, had scratched her there
+badly. That, I think, disposes of the finger nail evidence against
+Carpenter.
+
+"The rest followed as a matter of course. An examination of Major Ross'
+collection of circulars describing those 'wanted' by the police of the
+various cities for the past six years revealed the photograph of Splain.
+Bristow has changed his appearance somewhat--enough, perhaps, to deceive
+the casual glance--but the identification was easy.
+
+"I then ran over to New York and got the Splain story. I knew he was so
+dead sure of having eluded everybody that he would stay here in
+Furmville. But, to make it absolutely sure, I sent him yesterday a
+telegram to keep him assured that I was working with him and ready to
+share discoveries with him. And I confess it afforded me a little
+pleasure, the sending of that wire. I was playing a kind of cat-and-mouse
+game."
+
+Bristow put up his hand, demanding attention. When Braceway ignored the
+gesture, he leaned back, smiling, derisive.
+
+"Morley's embezzlement and its consequences gave me a happy excuse for
+keeping on this fellow's trail while he was busy perfecting the machinery
+for Perry's destruction. The man's self-assurance, his conceit----"
+
+"I've had enough of this!" Bristow cut in violently, exhibiting his first
+deep emotion. He turned to Greenleaf:
+
+"Haven't you had enough of this drool? What's the man trying to establish
+anyhow? He talks in one breath about my having changed the outline of my
+face and the shape of my mouth, and in the next second about recognizing
+as me a photograph which he admits was taken at least six years ago!
+
+"It's an alibi for himself, an excuse for not being able to prove that
+I'm the man who pawned the jewelry in Baltimore! It's thinner than air!"
+
+But Greenleaf's defection was now complete.
+
+"Go on," he said to Braceway. The more he thought of the full extent to
+which the embezzler had gulled him for the past week, the more he raged.
+
+"Not for me! I don't want any more of the drivel!" Bristow objected
+again, his voice raucous and still directed to Greenleaf. "What's _your_
+idea? I admit I'm wanted in New York on a trumped-up charge of
+embezzlement. This detective, by a stroke of blind luck, ran into that;
+and, as I say, I admit it.
+
+"You can deal with that as you see fit; that is, if you want to deal with
+it after what I've done for law and order, and for you, in this murder
+case.
+
+"But you can't be crazy enough to take any stock in this nonsense about
+my having been connected with the crime. Exercise your own intelligence!
+Great God, man! Do you mean to say you're going to let him cram this into
+you?"
+
+He got himself more in hand.
+
+"Think a minute. You know me well, chief. And you, Mr. Fulton, you're no
+child to be bamboozled and turned into a laughing stock by a detective
+who finds himself without a case--a pseudo expert on crime who tries to
+work the age-old trick of railroading a man guilty of a less offense!"
+
+"This is no place for an argument of the case," Braceway said crisply.
+"Mr. Abrahamson, tell us what you know about this man."
+
+"It is not much, Mr. Braceway," the Jew replied; "not as much as I would
+like. I've seen him several times; once in my place when he was fixed up
+with moustache and so forth, and twice when he was fixed up with a beard
+and a gold tooth; once again when he was sitting out here on his porch."
+
+Abrahamson talked rapidly, punctuating his phrases with quick gestures,
+enjoying the importance of his role.
+
+"Mr. Braceway," he explained smilingly to Greenleaf, "talked to me about
+the man with the beard--talked more than you did, chief. You know Mr.
+Braceway--how quick he is. He talked and asked me to try to remember
+where and when I had seen this Mr. Bristow. I had my ideas and my
+association of ideas. I remembered--remembered hard. That afternoon I
+took a holiday--I don't take many of those--and I walked past here.
+'I bet you,' I said to myself--not out real loud, you understand--'I bet
+you I know that man.' And I won my bet. I did know him.
+
+"This Mr. Splain and the man with the beard are the same, exactly the
+same."
+
+Bristow's smile was tolerant, as if he dealt with a child. But Fulton,
+his angry eyes boring into the accused man, saw that, for the first time,
+there were tired lines tugging the corners of his mouth. It was an
+expression that heralded defeat, the first faint shadow of despair.
+
+"You have my story, and I've the facts to prove it a hundred times over,"
+Braceway announced. "Why waste more time?"
+
+"For the simple reason," Bristow fought on, "that I'm entitled to a fair
+deal, an honest----"
+
+On the word "honest" Braceway turned with his electric quickness to
+Greenleaf, and, as he did so, Bristow leaned back in his chair, as if
+determined not to argue further. His face assumed its hard, bleak calm;
+his cold self-control returned.
+
+"Now, get this!" Braceway's incisive tone whipped Greenleaf to closer
+attention. "You've an embezzler and murderer in your hands. He admits one
+crime; I've proved the other. The rest is up to you. Put the irons on
+him. Throw him into a cell! You'll be proud of it the rest of your life.
+Here's the warrant."
+
+He drew the paper from his hip pocket and tossed it to the chief.
+
+"Get busy," he insisted. "This man's the worst type of criminal I've ever
+encountered. Not content with blackmailing and robbing a woman, he
+murdered her; not satisfied with that, he deliberately planned the death
+of an innocent man because he, in his cowardice, was afraid to take the
+ordinary chances of escaping detection. By openly parading his pursuit of
+breakers of the law, he secured secretly his opportunity to excel their
+basest actions. He----"
+
+Quicker than thought, Braceway lunged forward with his cane and struck
+the hand Bristow had lifted swiftly to his throat. The blow sent a pocket
+knife clattering to the floor. A policeman, picking it up, saw that the
+opened blade worked on a spring.
+
+The accused man sank back in his chair. The gray immobility of his face
+had broken up. The features worked curiously, forming themselves for a
+second to a pattern of mean vindictiveness. His right hand still numbed
+by the blow, he took his handkerchief with the left and flicked from his
+neck, close to the ear, a single red bead.
+
+"Search him," Braceway ordered one of the officers.
+
+Bristow submitted to that. When he looked at Braceway, his face was still
+bleak.
+
+"You've got me," he said in a tone thoroughly matter-of-fact. "I'm
+through. I'll give you a statement."
+
+"You mean a confession?"
+
+"It amounts to that."
+
+"Not here," Braceway refused curtly. "We've no stenographer."
+
+"I'd prefer to write it myself anyway," he insisted. "It won't take me
+fifteen minutes on the typewriter." Seeing Braceway hesitate, he added:
+"You'll get it this way, or not at all. Suit yourself."
+
+The detective did not underestimate the man's stubborn nerve.
+
+"I'm agreeable, chief," he said to Greenleaf, "if you are."
+
+"Yes," the chief agreed. "It's as good here as anywhere else."
+
+Darkness had grown in the room. Abrahamson and the policeman pulled down
+the window shades. Greenleaf turned on the lights.
+
+Bristow limped to the typewriter and sat down. Braceway opened the drawer
+of the typewriter stand and saw that it contained nothing but sheets of
+yellow "copy" paper cut to one-half the size of ordinary letter paper.
+
+Every trace of agitation had left Bristow. Colour crept back into his
+cheeks.
+
+Braceway and Greenleaf watched him closely. They had the idea that he
+still contemplated suicide, that he sought to divert their attention from
+himself by interesting them in what he wrote. They remembered the boast
+he had made in the cell in New York.
+
+He felt their wariness, and smiled.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE LAST CARD
+
+
+He worked with surprising rapidity, tearing from the machine and passing
+to Braceway each half-page as he finished it. He wrote triple-space,
+breaking the story into many paragraphs, never hesitating for a choice of
+words.
+
+  "My name is Thomas F. Splain.
+
+  "I am forty years old.
+
+  "I am 'wanted' in New York for embezzlement.
+
+  "Fear is an unknown quantity to me. I have always had ample
+   self-confidence. The world belongs to the impudent.
+
+  "I learned long ago that no man is at heart either grateful, or honest,
+   or unselfish."
+
+With a turn of the roller, he flicked that off the machine and, without
+raising his head, passed it to Braceway. The detective glanced at it long
+enough to get its meaning and handed it to Fulton. When it was offered to
+Greenleaf, he shook his head.
+
+The chiefs rage had reached its high point. To his realization of how
+perfectly he had been duped, there was added the humiliation of having
+two members of his force as witnesses of its revelation.
+
+"If he makes a move," he thought savagely, fingering the revolver in the
+side pocket of his coat, "I'll kill him certain."
+
+The man at the machine wrote on:
+
+  "After leaving New York, I was caught in a street accident in Chicago,
+   suffering a broken nose. Thanks to my physicians--an incompetent lot,
+   these doctors--I emerged with a crooked nose.
+
+  "That was a help. I then had all my teeth extracted. Knowing dentistry,
+   I saw the possibilities of disguise by wearing differently shaped sets
+   of teeth.
+
+  "Note my heavily protruding lower lip--and, at rare intervals, my
+   hollow cheeks.
+
+  "Also, there's your gold-tooth mystery--solved!
+
+  "As a disguise, the gold tooth is admirable. I mean a solid, complete
+   tooth of gold, garish in the front part of the mouth.
+
+  "It unfailingly changes the expression; frequently, it degrades and
+   brutalizes the face. Try it.
+
+  "Using my crooked nose as an every-day precaution, I always
+   straightened it for night work. Forestier taught me that--great man,
+   Forestier; marvellous with noses.
+
+  "He is now piling up a fortune as make-up specialist for motion
+   pictures in Los Angeles--has a secret preparation with which he
+   'builds' new noses.
+
+  "Changing the colour of my eyes was something beyond the police
+   imagination.
+
+  "I got the trick from a man in Cincinnati--another great character.
+   Homatropine is the basic element of his preparation.
+
+  "Some day women will hear of it and make him rich. He deserves it."
+
+Fulton, after he had read that, looked at Braceway out of tortured eyes.
+This turning of his tragedy into jest defied his strength.
+
+"That's enough of that," Braceway raised his voice above the clatter of
+the typewriter. "Get down to the crime, or stop!"
+
+"By all means," Bristow assented.
+
+Flicking from the roller the page he had already begun, he tore it up and
+inserted another.
+
+  "I met Enid Fulton six years ago at Hot Springs, Virginia. She fell in
+   love with me.
+
+  "I had always known that a rich woman's indiscretions could be made to
+   yield big dividends. She was a victim of her----"
+
+Braceway's grasp caught the writer's hands.
+
+"Eliminate that!" he ordered sternly. "It's not necessary."
+
+Bristow, imperturbable, his motions quick and sure, tore up that page
+also, and started afresh:
+
+  "Later she believed I had embezzled in order to assure her ease and
+   luxury from the date of our marriage.
+
+  "Her exaggerated sense of fair play, of obligation, was an aid to my
+   representations of the situation.
+
+  "Although she no longer loved me and did love Withers, my hold on her,
+   rather on her purse, could not be broken.
+
+  "She gave me the money in Atlantic City and Washington. I played the
+   market, and lost. I no longer had my cunning in dealing with stocks.
+
+  "I came here as soon as I had learned of her presence in Furmville. At
+   first, she was reasonable. Abrahamson knows that. I pawned several
+   little things with him.
+
+  "At last she grew obstinate. She argued that, if she pawned any more of
+   her jewels, she would be unable to redeem them because her father had
+   failed in business.
+
+  "But I had to have funds. Several times I pointed this out to her when
+   I saw her in Number Five--always after midnight, for my own protection
+   as well as hers.
+
+  "Finally, my patience was exhausted. Last Monday night, or early
+   Tuesday morning, I told her so, quite clearly.
+
+  "She argued, plead with me. All this was in whispers. The necessity of
+   whispering so long irritated me.
+
+  "Her refusal, flat and final, to part with the jewels enraged me. It
+   was then that I made the first big mistake of my life.
+
+  "I lost my temper. Men who can not control their tempers under the most
+   trying circumstances should let crime alone. They will fail.
+
+  "I killed her--a foolish result of the folly of yielding to my rage.
+
+  "Standing there and looking at her, I pondered, with all the clarity I
+   could command. In a second, I perceived the advisability of throwing
+   the blame upon some other person."
+
+The faces of Braceway and Fulton mirrored to the others the horror of the
+stuff they were reading. The scene taxed the emotional balance of all of
+them. The evil-faced man at the typewriter, the father getting by degrees
+the description of his daughter's death, the policemen waiting to put the
+murderer behind bars----
+
+Abrahamson, peculiarly wrought upon by the tenseness of it all, wished he
+had not come. His back felt creepy. He lit a cigarette, puffed it to a
+torch and threw it down.
+
+Bristow wrote on:
+
+  "Mechanically, my fingers went to a pocket in my vest and played with
+   two metal buttons I had picked up in my kitchen the day before,
+   Monday.
+
+  "I knew the buttons had come from the overalls of the negro, Perry
+   Carpenter. It would be easy to drop one there, the other on the floor
+   of my kitchen, where I had originally found them.
+
+  "That would be the beginning of identifying him as the murderer. He had
+   been half-drunk the day before.
+
+  "The rest was simple--dropping the lavalliere links back of Number
+   Five, placing the lavalliere in the yard of his house, and so on.
+
+  "I had one piece of luck which, of course, I did not count on when I
+   first adopted this simple course. That was when Greenleaf asked me
+   to help him in finding the murderer. A confiding soul-your
+   Greenleaf--and insured by nature against brain storms.
+
+  "Such a turn was a godsend. I had become the investigator of my own
+   crime.
+
+  "There remains to be told only the fact that I made a second trip to
+   Number Five.
+
+  "Having come back here in safety, I perceived I had left there without
+   the jewels she was wearing and without those in her jewel cabinet.
+
+  "She had brought this cabinet into the living room to show me how her
+   supply of jewelry had been depleted.
+
+  "To murder and not get the fruits of it, is like picking one's own
+   pocket. I returned immediately and rectified the mistake.
+
+  "Before departing this last time, I switched on the lights to assure
+   myself that I had left only the clue to the negro's presence, none to
+   my own.
+
+  "That explains Withers' story of his struggle at the foot of the steps.
+   We really had it.
+
+  "In the ordinary course of events, the negro would have gone to the
+   chair.
+
+  "But there were complications I did not foresee.
+
+  "Morley's theft and clamour for money from Miss Fulton, Withers'
+   jealousy, and my own extra precaution of appearing with beard and gold
+   tooth in the Brevord Hotel, so as to shift suspicion to a mysterious
+   'unknown' in case of necessity; all these things left too many clues,
+   presented an embarrassment of riches.
+
+  "If I had known of them in advance, either Morley or Withers would have
+   paid the penalty for the crime. The negro would never have received my
+   attention.
+
+  "I have no game leg, never have had. The brace made it easy for me to
+   transform myself into an agile, powerful man in my 'private' work.
+
+  "I have no tuberculosis, never have had. I have a normally flat chest.
+   Sluggish veins and capillaries in my face, caused by my having
+   suffered pathological blushing for ten years, cause a permanent flush
+   in my cheeks.
+
+  "That was enough to fool the physicians. Besides, when the Galenites
+   have once diagnosed your purse favourably, your disease is what you
+   please.
+
+  "I have said my first great mistake was losing my temper with Enid
+   Withers.
+
+  "My second was my laughter in the cab the night Braceway and I
+   questioned Morley. I knew he was holding back something, but I never
+   dreamed it was his knowledge of my having done the murder.
+
+  "That laugh was suicidal, for it was the disarming of myself by myself.
+
+  "But for the albino discovery by Braceway, my conviction would have
+   been impossible. The case against Perry was too strong.
+
+  "Still, it is as well this way as another. I should never have served
+   the time for embezzlement. A free life is a fine thing. I suspect that
+   death, perhaps, is even finer."
+
+He handed the last page to Braceway, leaned back in his chair, put up his
+arms and yawned. The glance with which he swept the faces of those before
+him was arrogant. It had a sinister audacity.
+
+"The confession's complete," Braceway told Greenleaf, clipping his words
+short. "Take him away. No--wait!" He pulled a pen from his pocket and
+turned to the prisoner.
+
+"Oh, the signature," Bristow said coolly. "I forgot that."
+
+He took the typewritten pages roughly from Fulton, and in a bold, free
+hand wrote at the bottom of each: "Thomas F. Splain."
+
+"I'm ready," he announced, rising from his chair so that he jostled
+Fulton unnecessarily.
+
+The old man, his self-control broken at last, struck him with open hand
+full in the face. His fingers left three red stripes across the
+murderer's white cheek.
+
+Before Braceway could interfere, Bristow checked his impulse to strike
+back and gave Fulton a long, level look.
+
+"You're welcome to it," he said finally; "welcome, old man. I guess I
+still owe you something, at that."
+
+"Put the cuffs on him," ordered Greenleaf.
+
+"First, though, I'd like to have a clean collar, some clean linen; and I
+want to get rid of this brace," Bristow interrupted.
+
+"To hell with what you want!" Greenleaf cried, a shade more purple with
+rage.
+
+Bristow turned to Braceway:
+
+"You're right. The stuff's in the sole of this shoe."
+
+"Let's take charge of that now," Braceway said to the chief. They each
+grasped one of the prisoner's arms and hustled him with scant ceremony
+to his bedroom. Bristow removed his trousers and, unbuckling the belt and
+straps of the steel brace, took off the thick-soled shoe.
+
+Greenleaf put his hand into it and tugged at the inner sole.
+
+"Opens on the outside," prompted Braceway, "underneath, near the instep."
+
+The chief, after fumbling with it a moment, got it open. The jewels
+streamed to the floor, a little cascade of radiance and colour. He picked
+them up, getting down on all-fours so as not to miss one.
+
+"Don't be unreasonable," Bristow complained as he slipped on another
+shoe. "Let me have a clean shirt and collar."
+
+"Be quick about it," Braceway consented, his voice heavy with contempt.
+
+Greenleaf, holding him again by one arm, shoved him toward the bureau. He
+got out of his shirt, Greenleaf shifting his grasp so as not to let go of
+him for a second. In trying to put the front collar button into the fresh
+shirt, he broke off its head.
+
+"Come on," growled the chief. "You don't need a collar anyway."
+
+"Not so fast! I've more than one collar button."
+
+He put his hand into a tray and picked up another. It had a long shank
+and was easily manipulated because of the catch that permitted the
+movement of its head, as if on a hinge.
+
+"This is better," he said, fingering it, unhurried as a man with hours to
+throw away.
+
+"Get a move on! Get a move!" Greenleaf growled again, tightening his hold
+until it was painful.
+
+Bristow, apparently bent on throwing off this rough grasp on his left
+arm, swiftly raised his right hand with the button to his mouth.
+
+For the fraction of a second his eyes, bright and defiant, met
+Braceway's. The detective, reading the elation in them, shouted:
+
+"Look out!"
+
+There was a click. And Bristow flung away the button as Braceway caught
+at his hand.
+
+"I beat you after----" he tried to boast.
+
+But the poison, quicker than he had thought, cut short his utterance. His
+eyelids flickered twice. He collapsed against Greenleaf and slid,
+crumpled, to the floor.
+
+"Cyanide," said Braceway. "He had it in the shank of that collar button."
+
+Greenleaf bent over him.
+
+"God, it's quick!" he announced. "He's dead."
+
+
+
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