On the way returning to Gotham, Garrison learned every fact concerning John Hardy, his former places of residence, his former friends, his ways of life and habits that he deemed important to the issues and requirements now in hand, with Dorothy's stepbrother more than half suspected of the crime.
Dorothy gladly supplied the information. She had been on the verge of despair, harboring her fear and despair all alone, with the loyal desire to protect not only Foster, but Alice as well, and now she felt an immense relief to have a man's clear-headed aid.
Garrison held out no specific hope.
The case looked black for young Durgin at the best, and the fellow had run away. A trip to the small Connecticut town of Rockdale, where Hardy had once resided, and to which it had long been his wont to return as often as once a month, seemed to Garrison imperative at this juncture.
He meant to see Tuttle at six, and start for the country in the evening.
He outlined his plan to Dorothy, acquainting her with the fact that he had captured Theodore's spy, from whom he hoped for news.
By the time they came to the house near Washington Square, Dorothy was all but asleep from exhaustion. The strain, both physical and mental, to which she had been subjected during some time past, and more particularly during the past two days, told quickly now when at last she felt ready to place all dependence on Garrison and give up to much-needed rest.
The meeting of Miss Ellis and Dorothy was but slightly embarrassing to Garrison, when it presently took place. Explaining to the woman of the house that his "wife" desired to stop all night in town, rather than go on to Long Island, while he himself must be absent from the city, he readily procured accommodations without exciting the least suspicion.
Garrison merely waited long enough to make Dorothy promise she would take a rest without delay, and then he went himself to a hotel restaurant, near by in Fifth Avenue, devoured a most substantial meal, and was five minutes late at his office.
Tuttle had not yet appeared. The hall before the door was deserted.The sign on his glass had been finished.
Garrison went in. There were letters all over the floor, together with Dorothy's duplicate telegram, a number of cards, and some advertising circulars. One of the cards bore the name of one J. P. Wilder, and the legend, "Representing the New YorkEvening Star." There was nothing, however, in all the stuff that appeared to be important.
Garrison read the various letters hastily, till he came to one from the insurance company, his employers, requesting haste in the matter of the Hardy case, and reminding him that he had reported but once. This he filed away.
Aware at last that more than half an hour had gone, without a sign from his man, he was on the point of going to the door to look out in the hall when Tuttle's shadow fell upon the glass.
"I stayed away a little too long, I know," he said. "I was trying to get a line on old man Robinson, to see if he'd give anything away, but I guess he's got instructions from his son, who's gone away from town."
"Gone away from town?" repeated Garrison. "Where has he gone?"
"I don't know. The old man wouldn't say."
"You haven't seen Theodore?"
"No. He left about five this afternoon. The old man and his wife are stopping in Sixty-fifth Street, where they used to live some months ago."
"What did you report about me?"
"Nothing, except I hadn't seen you again," said Tuttle. "The old man leaves it all to his son. He didn't seem to care where you had gone."
Garrison pondered the matter carefully. He made almost nothing out ofTheodore's departure from the scene. It might mean much or little.That Theodore had something up his sleeve he entertained no doubt.
"It's important to find out where he has gone," he said. "See old Robinson again. Tell him you have vital information on a special point that Theodore instructed you to deliver to no one but himself, and the old man may tell you where you should go. I am going out of town to-night. Leave your address in case I wish to write."
"I'll do my best," said Tuttle, writing the address on a card. "Is there anything more?"
"Yes. You know who the two men were who knocked me down in Central Park and left a bomb in my pocket. Get around them in any way you can, ascertain what agreement they had with young Robinson, or what instructions, and find out why it was they did not rob me. Come here at least once a day, right along, whether you find me in or not."
Once more Tuttle stated he would do his best. He left, and Garrison, puzzling over Theodore's latest movement, presently locked up his office and departed from the building.
He was no more than out on the street than he came upon Theodore's tracks in a most unexpected direction. A newsboy came by, loudly calling out his wares. AnEvening Star, beneath his arm, stared at Garrison with type fully three inches high with this announcement:
John Hardy May Have Been Slain! Beautiful Beneficiary Married Just in Time!
Garrison bought the paper.
With excitement and chagrin in all his being he glanced through the story of himself and Dorothy—all that young Robinson could possibly know, or guess, dished up with all the sensational garnishments of which the New York yellow press is capable.
Sick and indignant with the knowledge that Dorothy must be apprised of this at once, and instructed to remain in hiding, to induce all about her to guard her from intrusion and to refuse to see all reporters who might pursue the story, he hastened at once towards Washington Square, and encountered his "wife," almost upon entering the house.
She was white with alarm.
He thought she had already seen the evening sheet.
"Jerold!" she said, "something terrible has happened. When I got up, half an hour ago to dress—my wedding certificate was gone!"
Without, for a moment, comprehending the drift of Dorothy's fears, Garrison led her to a parlor of the house, looking at her in a manner so fixed that she realized their troubles were not confined to the loss of her certificate.
"What do you think? What do you fear? There isn't anything else?" she said, as he still remained dumb for a moment. "What shall we do?"
"Theodore threatened that something might occur," he said. "He has evidently done his worst, all at once."
"Why—but I thought perhaps my certificate was stolen here," whisperedDorothy in agitation. "How could Theodore——"
"No one in this house could have known you had such a document about you," interrupted Garrison. "While you were drugged, or chloroformed, in the Robinsons' house, the old woman, doubtless, searched you thoroughly. You told me your certificate was sewed inside——"
"Inside—yes, inside," she interrupted. "I thought it was safe, for they put a blank paper in its place, and I might not have thought of anything wrong if I had not discovered a black thread used instead of the white silk I had been so careful to employ."
"There is ample proof that Theodore has utilized his wits to good advantage," he said. "Your marriage-certificate episode is only a part of what he has achieved. This paper contains all the story—suggesting that your uncle may have been murdered, and telling the conditions of the will."
He held up the paper before her startled eyes, and saw the look of alarm that came upon her.
"Printed—in the paper!" she exclaimed in astonishment and utter dismay. "Why, how could such a thing happen?"
She took the paper and scanned the story hurriedly, making exclamations as she read.
"Theodore—more of Theodore," said Garrison. "From his point of view, and with all his suspicions concerning our relationship, it is a master-stroke. It renders our position exceedingly difficult."
"But—how could he have found out all these things?" gasped Dorothy."How could he know?"
"He has guessed very shrewdly, and he has doubtless pumped your stepbrother of all that he happened to know."
"What shall we do?" she repeated hopelessly. "We can't prove anything—just now—and what will happen when the will comes up for probate?"
"I'll land him in prison, if he doesn't pull out of it now," said Garrison, angered as much by Theodore's diabolical cleverness as he was by this premature publicity given to the story. "He has carried it all with a mighty high hand, assured of our fear to take the business into court. He has stirred up a fight that I don't propose to lose!—a fight that has roused all the red-hot Crusader of my being!"
"But—what shall we do? All the newspaper people will be digging at the case and doing their best to hunt up everyone concerned!"
"No reporters can be seen. If the fact leaks out that you are here, through anyone connected with the house, you must move at once, and change your name, letting no one but me know where you are."
She looked at him blankly. "Alone? Can't you help me, Jerold?"
"It is more important for me to hasten up country now than it was before," he answered. "I must work night and day to clear things up about the murder."
"But—if Foster should really be guilty?"
"He'll be obliged to take his medicine—otherwise suspicion might possibly rest upon you."
"Good Heavens!"
She was very pale.
"This story in theStarhas precipitated everything," he added. "Already it contains a hint that you and your 'husband' are the ones who benefit most by the possible murder of John Hardy."
She sank on a chair and looked at him helplessly.
"I suppose you'll have to go—but I don't know what I shall do without you. How long do you think you'll be away?"
"It is quite impossible to say. I shall return as soon as circumstances permit. I'll write whenever I can."
"I shall need some things from the house," she said. "I have absolutely nothing here."
"Buy what you need, and remain indoors as much as you can," he instructed. "Reporters will be sure to haunt the house in Ninety-third Street, hoping to see us return."
"It's horrible!" said Dorothy. "It almost makes me wish I had never heard of any will!"
Garrison looked at her with frank adoration in his eyes.
"Whatever the outcome, I shall always be glad," he said—"glad of the day you needed—needed assistance—glad of the chance it has given me to prove my—prove my—friendship."
"I'll try to be worthy of your courage," she answered, returning his look with an answering glance in which the love-light could only at best be a trifle modified. "But—I don't see how it will end."
"About this marriage certificate——" he started, when the door-bell rang interruptingly.
In fear of being overheard by the landlady, already attending a caller, Garrison halted, to wait. A moment later the door was opened by the lady of the house herself, and a freshly-groomed, smooth-shaven young man was ushered in. The room was the only one in the house for this semi-public use.
"Excuse me," said the landlady sweetly. "Someone to see Miss Ellis."
The visitor bowed very slightly to Dorothy and Garrison, and stood somewhat awkwardly near the door, with his hat in his hand. The landlady, having made her excuses for such an intrusion, disappeared to summon Miss Ellis.
Garrison was annoyed. There was nothing to do but to stand there in embarrassing silence. Then Miss Ellis came shyly in at the door, dressed so becomingly that it seemed not at all unlikely she had hoped for the evening's visitor.
"Oh, Mr. Hunter, this is a very pleasant surprise!" she said. "Allow me to introduce my friends, Mr. and Mrs. Fairfax." She added to Garrison and Dorothy, "This is Mr. Hunter, of the New YorkStar."
Prepared to bow and let it go at that, Garrison started, ever so slightly, on learning the visitor's connection. Mr. Hunter, on his part, meeting strangers unexpectedly, appeared to be diffident and quite conventional, but pricked up his ears, which were strung to catch the lightest whisper of news, at the mention of the Fairfax name.
"Not the Fairfax of the Hardy case?" he said, for the moment intent on nothing so moving as a possible service to his paper. "Of course you've seen——"
Garrison sat down on the copy of theStarwhich Dorothy had left in a chair. He deftly tucked it up beneath his coat.
"No, oh, no, certainly not," he said, and pulling out his watch, he added to Dorothy, "I shall have to be going. Put on your hat and come out for a two-minute walk."
Then, to the others:
"Sorry to have to run off in this uncomplimentary fashion, but I trust we shall meet again."
Hunter felt by instinct that this was the man of all men whom he ought, in all duty, to see. He could not insist upon his calling in such a situation, however, and Garrison and Dorothy, bowing as they passed, were presently out in the hall with the parlor door closed behind them. In half a minute more they were out upon the street.
"You'll be obliged to find other apartments at once," he said. "You'd better not even go back to pay the bill. I'll send the woman a couple of dollars and write that you made up your mind to go along home, after all."
"But—I wanted to ask a lot of questions—of Miss Ellis," said Dorothy, thereby revealing the reason she had wished to come here before. "I thought perhaps——"
"Questions about me?" interrupted Garrison, smiling upon her in the light of a street-lamp they were passing. "I can tell you far more about the subject than she could even guess—if we ever get the time."
Dorothy blushed as she tried to meet his gaze.
"Well—it wasn't that—exactly," she said. "I only thought—thought it might be interesting to know her."
"It's far more interesting to know where you will go," he answered."Let me look at this paper for a minute."
He pulled forth theStar, turned to the classified ads, found the"Furnished Rooms," and cut out half a column with his knife.
"Let me go back where I was to-night," she suggested. "I am really too tired to hunt a place before to-morrow. I can slip upstairs and retire at once, and the first thing in the morning I can go to a place where Alice used to stay, with a very deaf woman who never remembers my name and always calls me Miss Root."
"Where is the place?" said Garrison, halting as Dorothy halted.
"In West Eighteenth Street." She gave him the number. "It will look so very queer if I leave like this," she added. "I'd rather not excite suspicion."
"All right," he replied, taking out a booklet and jotting down "Miss Root," and the address she had mentioned. "I'll write to you in the name the deaf woman remembers, or thinks she remembers, and no one need know who you are. If I hurry now I can catch the train that connects with the local on the Hartford division for Rockdale."
They turned and went back to the house.
"You don't know how long you'll be gone?" she said as they neared the steps. "You cannot tell in the least?"
"Long enough to do some good, I hope," he answered. "Meantime, don't see anybody. Don't answer any questions; and don't neglect to leave here early in the morning."
She was silent for a moment, and looked at him shyly.
"I shall feel a little bit lonely, I'm afraid," she confessed—"with none of my relatives, or friends. I hope you'll not be very long. Good-by."
"Good-by," said Garrison, who could not trust himself to approach the subject she had broached; and with his mind reverting to the subject of his personal worry in the case, he added: "By the way, the loss of your wedding certificate can be readily repaired if you'll tell me the name of the preacher, or the justice of the peace——"
"I'd rather not—just at present," she interrupted, in immediate agitation. "Good-night—I'll have to go in."
She fled up the steps, found the door ajar, and pushing it open, stood framed by the light for a moment, as she turned to look back where he was standing.
Only for a moment did she hover there, however.
He could not see her face as she saw his.
He could not know that a light of love and a mute appeal for forgiveness lay together in the momentary glance bestowed upon him.
Then she closed the door; and as one in a dream he slowly walked away.
Garrison's ride on the train was a matter of several hours' duration. Not only did he read every line of the story in theStar, which he felt convinced had been furnished by young Robinson, but he likewise had time to reflect on all the phases, old and new, of the case in which he was involved.
But wander where they would, his thoughts invariably swung around the troubled circle to Dorothy and the topic was she married or not, and if she was,—where was the man?
He could not reach a decision.
Heretofore he had reasoned there could be no genuine Fairfax; to-night he entertained many doubts of his former deductions. He found it possible to construe Dorothy's actions both ways. She was afraid to have him search out the man who had written her wedding certificate, perhaps because it was a fraud, or perhaps because therewasa Fairfax somewhere, concerning whom something must be hidden.
The murder mystery, the business of the will, even the vengeance he promised himself he would wreak on Theodore, sank into significance in the light of his personal worry. There was only one thing worth while, and that was love.
He was rapidly approaching a frame of mind in which no sacrifice would be too great to be made, could he only be certain of winning Dorothy, heart-free, for his own.
For more than an hour he sat thinking, in the car, oblivious to the flight of time, or to the towns through which he was passing. He gave it up at last and, taking from his pocket a book he employed for memoranda, studied certain items there, supplied by Dorothy, concerning her uncle and his ways of life. There were names of his friends and his enemies among the scribbled data, together with descriptive bits concerning Hardy's personality.
Marking down additional suggestions and otherwise planning his work to be done at Rockdale, Garrison reflected there was little apparent hope of clearing young Durgin of suspicion, unless one trifling hint should supply the clew. Dorothy had stated that her Uncle John had long had some particularly bitter and malicious enemy, a man unknown to herself, from whom she believed Mr. Hardy might have been fleeing, from time to time, in the trips which had become the habit of his life.
That this constant moving from place to place had been the bane of his existence was a theory that Dorothy had formed a year before. Yet, for all she knew, it might have been young Foster Durgin whom her uncle was trying to avoid!
The train connection for Rockdale was wretchedly timed. What with a long wait at the junction and a long delay at a way station farther out, it was nearly one o'clock when at length his destination was reached and Garrison, with his steel-trap suit-case in hand, found his way to a second-rate hotel, where, to his great relief, the beds were far better than they looked.
He had taken the precaution to register as Henry Hilborn, realizing that Rockdale doubtless abounded in acquaintances of Hardy's who would probably read the published story of his will in their own local papers in the morning. He wrote at once to Dorothy, under the name of Miss Root, apprising her of his altered name and his address.
In the morning he was early at his work. Representing himself as nothing more than the agent of the New York Insurance Company, for which he was, in fact, conducting his various investigations, at least in part, he rapidly searched out one after another of the persons whose names Dorothy had supplied, but all to little purpose.
He found the town very much alive indeed to the news which theStarhad blazoned to the world. Hardy had been a well-known figure, off and on, for many years in Rockdale, and the names of the Durgins and of Dorothy were barely less familiar.
Garrison's difficulty was not that the people talked too little, but rather that they talked too much, and said almost nothing in the process. New trivialities were exceedingly abundant.
He worked all day with no results of consequence. The persons whose names had been supplied by Dorothy had, in turn, furnished more names by the dozen, alleging that this man or that knew John Hardy better than the proverbial brother, if possible; nevertheless, one after another, they revealed their ignorance of any vital facts that Garrison could use.
On the following day he learned that Paul Durgin, the nephew credited with having claimed the body of the murdered man, lived ten miles out on a farm, amassing a fortune rearing ducks.
Hiring a team, Garrison drove to Durgin's farm. He found his man in the center of a vast expanse of duck-pens, where ducks by the thousand, all singularly white and waterless, were greeting their master with acclaim.
Durgin came out of the duck midst to see his visitor. He was a large, taciturn being, healthy, strong, independent, a trifle suspicious and more than a trifle indifferent as to the final disposal of John Hardy's fortune.
Garrison, at first, found him hard to handle. He had not yet read the papers. He knew nothing at all of what was being said; and now that he heard it at last, from Garrison's lips, he scarcely did more than nod his head.
Garrison was annoyed. He determined on awakening the duck-stupored being, unless the task should prove hopeless.
"Mr. Durgin," he said, "the reasons for supposing that Hardy was murdered—poisoned—are far more convincing than anyone really supposes—and suspicion points particularly at a person in whom you may and may not be interested—your younger brother, Foster Durgin."
A curious white appearance crept all about the smooth-shaven mouth of the duck man. He was not in the least an emotionless clod; he was not even cold or indifferent, but silent, slow at giving expression to anything but excellent business capabilities.
He looked at Garrison steadily, but with dumb appeal in his eyes. The blow had gone home with a force that made Garrison sorry.
"How could that be?" the man inquired, "even with Foster wild?"
"He may not be guilty—it's my business to discover who is," said Garrison, with ready sympathy. "It looks as if he had a motive. With his knowledge of photography and his dabbling in the art, he has almost certainly handled poison—the particular poison used to destroy John Hardy's life. He was there in Hickwood at the time of the crime. He has gambled in Wall Street, and lost, and now has disappeared. You can see I need your help to clear the case."
Durgin sat down on a box, picked up a sliver of wood and began to chew it slowly. He was not a man of rapid thoughts; and he was stunned.
"How did you find out all these things?" he said.
"From Dorothy, partially, and in part from my own investigations."
"Dorothy didn't go back on the boy like that?" The man was hurt by the thought.
"Not at all. She tried to shield him. I came to Rockdale on her account, to try to discover if there is anyone else who might have had a motive for the crime."
Durgin pulled the sliver of wood to shreds with his teeth.
"I don't think Foster would have done it," he said, concealing the pain in his breast. "He's been wild. I've lost all patience with his ways of livin', but Uncle John was never afraid of Foster, though he was of Hiram Cleave."
"What's that?" said Garrison, instantly, alive to a possible factor in the case. "Do you mean there was a man Mr. Hardy was afraid of—Hiram what?"
"He never wanted me to tell of that," said Durgin in his heavy manner. "He wasn't a coward; he said so, and I know it's true, but he had a fear of Cleave."
"Now that's just exactly what I've got to know!" said Garrison. "Man alive, if you wish to help me clear your brother, you've got to give me all the facts you can think of concerning Mr. Hardy, his enemies, and everything else in the case! What sort of a man is this Cleave?"
"A short, middle-aged man," drawled Durgin deliberately. "I never saw him but once."
"What was the cause of enmity between him and Hardy, do you know?"
"No, I don't. It went far back—a woman, I guess. But I hope you won't ever say I told that it was. I promised I wouldn't, and I never did till now."
The big fellow looked at Garrison with honest anxiety in his eyes.
"It's not my business to tell things," Garrison assured him. "This is a matter perhaps of life and death for your brother. Do you think Mr. Hardy feared this man Cleave would take his life?"
"He did, yes."
"Was it ever attempted before?"
Durgin looked at him oddly.
"I think so, but I couldn't be sure."
"You mean, Mr. Hardy told you a little about it, but, perhaps, not all?"
"How did you know that?" Durgin asked, mystified by Garrison's swiftness of thinking.
"I don't know anything. I'm trying to find out. How much did Hardy tell you of a former attempt on his life?"
"He didn't really tell it. He sort of let it out a little, and wouldn't say anything more."
"But you knew it was this man Cleave?"
"Yes, he was the one."
Garrison questioned eagerly: "Where is he now?"
"I don't know."
"When was it that you saw the man?"
"A year ago."
"Where?"
"In the village—Rockdale," answered Durgin.
"Mr. Hardy pointed him out?"
"Yes, but how did you——"
"What was the color of his hair?" Garrison interrupted.
"He had his hat on. I didn't see his hair."
"What did your uncle say at the time?"
"Nothing much, just 'that's the man'—that's all," said the duck man. "And he went away that night—I guess because Cleave turned around and saw us in the store."
"All right," said Garrison. "Where's your brother now?"
"I don't know. We don't get on."
"Do you think he knew anything about Mr. Hardy's will?"
Durgin answered with a query: "Which one?"
"Why, the only one, I suppose," said Garrison. "What do you mean?"
"Well, there must have been more than one," drawled the duck man with exasperating slowness. "Foster was down in the first, but that was burned. I don't think he ever saw the others, but he knew he wasn't a favorite any more."
"What about yourself?" asked Garrison.
"I asked Uncle John to leave me out. I've got enough," was the answer."We're no blood kin to the Hardys. I know I wasn't in the last."
"The last?" repeated Garrison. "You mean the last will of Mr.Hardy—the one in favor of Dorothy, in case she should be married?"
Durgin studied his distant ducks for a moment.
"No, I don't think that was the last. I'm sure that will wasn't the last."
Garrison stared at him fixedly.
"You're sure it wasn't the last?" he echoed. "What do you mean?"
"Uncle John sent a letter and said he'd made a brand-new will," answered Durgin in his steady way of certainty. "I burned up the letter only yesterday, clearing up my papers."
"You don't mean quite recently?" insisted Garrison.
"Since Dorothy got married," answered Durgin, at a loss to understandGarrison's interest. "Why?"
"This could make all the difference in the world to the case," Garrison told him. "Did he say what he'd done with this new document?"
"Just that he'd made a new will."
"Who helped him? Who was the lawyer? Who were the witnesses?"
"He didn't say."
Garrison felt everything disarranged. And Durgin's ignorance was baffling. He went at him aggressively.
"Where was your uncle when he wrote the letter?"
"He was up to Albany."
Albany! There were thousands of lawyers and tens of thousands of men who would do as witnesses in Albany!
"But," insisted Garrison, "perhaps he told you where it was deposited or who had drawn it up, or you may know his lawyer in Albany.
"No. He just mentioned it, that's all," said Durgin. "The letter was most about ducks."
"This is too bad," Garrison declared. "Have you any idea in the world where the will may be?"
"No, I haven't."
"You found nothing of it, or anything to give you a hint, when you claimed the body for burial, and examined his possessions in Hickwood?"
"No."
"Where was Dorothy then?"
"I don't know. She's always looked after Foster more than me, he being the weak one and most in need."
Desperate for more information. Garrison probed in every conceivable direction, but elicited nothing further of importance, save that an old-time friend of Hardy's, one Israel Snow, a resident of Rockdale, might perhaps be enabled to assist him.
Taking leave of Durgin, who offered his hand and expressed a deep-lying hope that something could be done to clear all suspicion from his brother, Garrison returned to Rockdale.
The news of a will made recently, a will concerning which Dorothy knew nothing,—this was so utterly disconcerting that it quite overshadowed, for a time, the equally important factor in the case supplied by Durgin's tale concerning this unknown Hiram Cleave.
Where the clews pointed now it was utterly impossible to know. If the fact should transpire that Dorothy did, in fact, know something of the new will made by her uncle, or if Foster knew, and no such will should ever be produced, the aspect of the case would be dark indeed.
Not at all convinced that Theodore Robinson might not yet be found at the bottom of the mystery, Garrison wondered where the fellow had gone and what his departure might signify.
Israel Snow was out of town. He would not return till the morrow.Garrison's third night was passed in the little hotel, and no word hadcome from Dorothy. He had written four letters to the EighteenthStreet address. He was worried by her silence.
On the following day Mr. Snow returned. He proved to be a stooped old man, but he supplied a number of important facts.
In the first place he stated that Hiram Cleave had long since assumed another name which no one in Rockdale knew. No one was acquainted with his business or his whereabouts. The reason of the enmity between him and John Hardy went deep enough to satisfy the most exacting mind.
Cleave, Hardy, and Scott, the inventor, had been boys together, and, in young manhood, chums. Hardy had fallen in love with Scott's sister, while he was still a young, romantic man. Cleave, developing an utterly malicious and unscrupulous nature, had deceived his friend Hardy, tried to despoil Miss Scott's very life, thereby ultimately causing her death, and Hardy had intervened only in time to save her from utter shame and ruin.
Then, having discovered Cleave guilty of a forgery, he had spared no effort or expense till he landed the creature in prison out in Indiana. Cleave had threatened his life at the time. He had long since been liberated. His malicious resentment had never been abated, and for the past two or three years, with Miss Scott a sad, sweet memory only, John Hardy had lived a lonely life, constantly moving to avoid his enemy.
A friend of another friend of a third friend of Snow's, who might have moved away, had once had a photograph of Cleave. Old Snow promised to procure it if possible and deliver it over to Garrison, who made eager offers to go and try to get it for himself, but without avail. He promised to wait for the picture, and returned at last to his hotel.
A telegram was waiting for him at the desk. He almost knew what he should find on reading it. The message read:
Please return at once. JERALDINE.
He paid off his bill, and posting a note to Israel Snow, giving an address, "Care of J. Garrison," in the New York building where he had his office, he caught the first train going down and arrived in Manhattan at three.
Delaying only long enough to deposit his suit-case at his lodgings, and neglecting the luncheon which he felt he could relish, Garrison posted off to Eighteenth Street with all possible haste.
The house he found at the number supplied by Dorothy was an old-time residence, with sky-scrapers looming about it. A pale woman met him at the door.
"Miss Root—is Miss Root in, please?" he said. "I'd like to see her."
"There's no such person here," said the woman.
"She's gone—she's given up her apartment?" said Garrison, at a loss to know what this could mean. "She went to-day? Where is she now?"
"She's never been here," informed the landlady. "A number of letters came here, addressed in her name, and I took them in, as people often have mail sent like that when they expect to visit the city, but she sent around a messenger and got them this morning."
Thoroughly disconcerted by this intelligence, Garrison could only ask if the woman knew whence the messenger had come—the address to which he had taken the letters. The woman did not know.
There was nothing to do but to hasten to the house near WashingtonSquare. Garrison lost no time in speeding down Fifth Avenue.
He came to the door just in time to meet Miss Ellis, dressed to go out.
"Why, how do you do, Mr. Fairfax?" she said. "Mrs. Fairfax asked me to tell you, if you came before I went, that she'd meet you at your office. I felt so sorry when she was ill."
"I didn't know she'd been ill," said Garrison. "I was afraid of something like that when she failed to write."
"Oh, yes, she was ill in the morning, the very day after you left," imparted Miss Ellis.
"I know you'll excuse me," interrupted Garrison. "I'll hurry along, and hope to see you again."
He was off so abruptly that Miss Ellis was left there gasping on the steps.
Ten minutes later he was stepping from the elevator and striding down the office-building hall.
Dorothy was not yet in the corridor. He opened the office, beheld a number of notes and letters on the floor, and was taking them up when Dorothy came in, breathless, her eyes ablaze with excitement.
"Jerold!" she started. "Please lock the door and——" when she was interrupted by the entrance of a man.
Dorothy gave a little cry and fled behind the desk.
Garrison faced the intruder, a tall, flaxen-haired, blue-eyed man with a long mustache—a person with every mark of the gentleman upon him.
"Well, sir," said Garrison, in some indignation, "what can I do for you?"
"We'll wait a minute and see," said the stranger. "My name is JeroldFairfax, and I came to claim my wife."
Garrison almost staggered. It was like a bolt from the bluest sky, where naught but the sun of glory had been visible.
"Dorothy! What does he mean?" he said, turning at once to the girl.
She sank weakly to a chair and could not meet the question in his eyes.
"Didn't you hear what I said?" demanded the visitor. "This is my wife and I'd like to know what it means, you or somebody else passing yourself off in my place!"
Garrison still looked at Dorothy.
"This isn't true, what the man is saying?" he inquired.
She tried to look up. "I—I—— Forgive me, please," she said."He's—He followed me here——"
"Certainly I followed," interrupted the stranger. "Why wouldn't I follow my wife? What does this mean, all this stuff they've been printing in the papers about some man passing as your husband?" He snatched out a newspaper abruptly, and waved it in the air.
"And if you're the man," he added, turning to Garrison, "I'll inform you right now——"
"That will do for you," Garrison interrupted. "This lady has come to my office on a matter of business. My services to her have nothing to do with you or any of your claims. And let me impress upon you the fact that her affairs with me are private in character, and that you are here uninvited."
"The devil I am!" answered Fairfax, practically as cool as Garrison himself. "I'll inform you that a man needs no invitation from a stranger, lawyer, detective, or otherwise, to seek the presence of his wife. And now that I've found her I demand that she come along with me!"
Dorothy started to her feet and fled behind Garrison.
"Please don't let him stay!" she said. "Don't let him touch me, please!"
Garrison faced the intruder calmly.
"I permit no one to issue orders in this office, either to me or my clients," he said. "Unless you are a far better man than I, you will do nothing to compel this lady to depart until she wishes to do so. You will oblige me by leaving my office."
"I'll do nothing of the sort!" answered Fairfax. "Your bluff sounds big, but I'm here to call it, understand? Dorothy, I command you to come."
"I will not go with such a man as you!" she cried in a sudden burst of anger. "You left me shamefully, half an hour after we were married! You've been no husband to me! You have only come back because you heard there might be money! I never wish to see you again!"
"Well, you're going to hear from me, now!" said Fairfax. "As for you,Mr. Garrison, assuming my name and——"
He was making a movement toward his pocket, throwing back his coat.
"Drop that!" interrupted Garrison. He had drawn his revolver with a quickness that was startling. "Up with your hand!"
Fairfax halted his impulse. His hand hung oscillating at the edge of his coat. A ghastly pallor overspread his face. His eyes took on a look of supernatural brightness. His mouth dropped open. He crouched a trifle forward, staring fixedly at the table. His hand had fallen at his side. He began to whisper:
"His brains are scattered everywhere, I see them—see them—everywhere—everywhere!" His hand came up before his eyes, the fingers spread like talons. He cried out brokenly, and, turning abruptly, hastened through the door, and they heard him running down the hall.
Dorothy had turned very white. She looked at Garrison almost wildly.
"That's exactly what he said before," she said, "when he pushed me from the train and ran away."
"What does it mean?" said Garrison, tense with emotion. "What have you done to me, Dorothy? He isn't your husband, after all?"
Dorothy sank once more in the chair. She looked at Garrison appealingly.
"I married him," she moaned. "He's crazy!"
Garrison, too, sat down. His pistol he dropped in his pocket.
"Why didn't you tell me this before?"
"I was afraid," she confessed. "I thought you wouldn't consent to be—to be—what you have been."
"Of course I wouldn't," Garrison responded. "What have I got myself into? Why did you do it?"
"I had to," she answered weakly. "Please don't scold me now—even if you have to desert me." Her voice broke in one convulsive sob, but she mastered herself sharply. "I'll go," she added, struggling to her feet. "I didn't mean to get you into all this——"
"Dorothy, sit down," he interrupted, rising instantly and placing his hand on her shoulder. "I didn't mean it—didn't mean what I said. I shan't desert you. I love you—I love you, Dorothy!"
She turned one hurt look upon him, then sank on the desk to cover her face.
"Oh, don't, don't, don't!" she said. "You haven't any right——"
"Forgive me," he pleaded. "I didn't intend to let you know. I didn't intend to use my position for anything like that. Forgive me—forget what I said—and let me serve you as I have before, with no thought of anything but—earning the money, my fee."
He turned away, striking his fist in his palm, and went across to the window.
For nearly five minutes neither spoke. Dorothy, torn by emotions too great to be longer restrained, had controlled her sobs almost immediately, but she had not dared to raise her eyes. She sat up at last, and with gaze averted from the figure against the square of light, composed herself as best she might.
"What is there we can do?" she said at last. "If you wish to be released from your—your position——"
"We won't talk of that," he interrupted, still looking out on the roofs below. "I'm in this to stay—till you dismiss me and bid me forget it—forget it and you—forever. But I need your help."
"I have made it very hard, I know," she said. "If I've acted deceitfully, it was the only way I thought I could do."
"Please tell me about this man Fairfax," he requested, keeping his back toward her as before. "You married him, where?"
"At Rockbeach, Massachusetts."
She was businesslike again.
"To satisfy the condition in your uncle's will?"
"No," the confession came slowly, but she made it with courage. "I had known him for quite a long time. He had—he had courted me a year. He was always a gentleman, cultured, refined, and fascinating in many ways. I thought I was in—I thought I was fond of him, very. He was brilliant—and romantic—and possessed of many qualities that appealed to me strongly. I'm quite sure now he exercised some spell upon me—but he was kind—and I believed him—that's all."
"Who married you?"
"A justice of the peace."
"Why not a minister?"
"Mr. Fairfax preferred the justice."
Garrison remained by the window stubbornly.
"You said the man is crazy. What did you mean?"
"Didn't you see?" she answered. "That light in his eyes is insanity. I thought it a soul-light shining through, though it worried me often, I admit. We were married at two in the afternoon and went at once to the station to wait there for the train. He bought the tickets and talked in his brilliant way until the train arrived. It only stopped for a moment.
"He put me on, then a spell came over him suddenly, I don't know what, and he pushed me off the steps, just as the train was moving out—and said the very thing you heard him say in here—and rode away and left me there, deserted."
She told it all in a dry-voiced way that cost her an effort, as Garrison felt and comprehended. He had turned about, in sheer sympathy for her predicament.
"What happened then?"
"I saw in a paper, two days later, he had been detained in a town in Ohio as being mentally unbalanced. In the meantime I had written to my Uncle John, while we were waiting at the station, telling him briefly I was married and to whom. The note was posted not five minutes before a postman came along and took up the letters in the box. I couldn't have stopped it had I wished to, and it never occurred to my mind to stop it, anyway."
"What did your uncle reply?"
"He wrote at once that he was thoroughly pleased. He had long hoped I might marry someone other than Theodore. He confessed that his will contained a clause to the effect that I should inherit no more than five thousand dollars, should I not have been married at least one month prior to his death, to a healthy, respectable man who was not my cousin.
"I dared not write that I had been deserted, or that Mr. Fairfax might be insane. I couldn't tell what to do. I hardly knew what to expect, or what I was, or anything. I could only pretend I was off on my honeymoon—and wait. Then came uncle's sudden death, and my lawyer sent me word about the will, asking when he should file it for probate. Then—then I knew I had to have asanehusband."
"And the will is not yet filed?"
"Not yet. And fortunately Mr. Trowbridge has had to be away."
Garrison pursued the topic of the will for purposes made necessary by his recent discoveries concerning a new one.
"Mr. Trowbridge had your uncle's testament in his keeping?"
Dorothy shook her head. "No. I believe he conferred with uncle's lawyer, just after his death, and read it there."
"Where did your uncle's lawyer live?"
"In Albany."
"Do you know his name?"
"I think it is Spikeman. Why?"
Garrison was looking at her again with professional coldness, despite the fact that his heart was fairly burning in his breast.
"Because," he said, "I learned from your stepbrother, Paul Durgin, near Rockdale, that your uncle made a later will, and we've got to get trace of the document before you can know where you stand."
Dorothy looked at him with her great brown eyes as startled as a deer's.
"Another will!" she said. "I may have lost everything, after all!What in the world would become of Foster then—and Alice?"
"And yourself?" added Garrison.
"Oh, it doesn't make the least difference about me," she answered in her bravery—bravery that made poor Garrison love her even more than before, "but they all depend so much upon me! Tell me, please, what did you find out about Foster?"
"Not a great deal," Garrison confessed. "This new will business was my most important discovery. Nevertheless, I confirmed your story of a man whom your uncle greatly feared. His name, it seems, is Hiram Cleave."
"That's the name! That's the man!" cried Dorothy. "I remember now!He once pinched my face till I cried."
"You have seen him, then? What sort of a looking being is he?"
"I don't remember much—only the horrid grin upon his face. I was only a child—and that impressed me. You didn't hear anything of Foster?"
"Not of his whereabouts—quite a bit concerning his character, none of it particularly flattering."
"I don't know where in the world he can be," said Dorothy. "PoorAlice! What are we going to do now, with all these new complications?"
"Do the best we can," said Garrison. "Aside from the will, and my work on the murder of your uncle, a great deal depends upon yourself, and your desires."
Dorothy looked at him in silence for a moment. A slight flush came to her face.
She said: "In what respect?"
Garrison had no intention of mincing matters now. He assumed a hardness of aspect wholly incompatible with his feelings.
"In respect to Mr. Fairfax," he answered. "He will doubtless return—dog your footsteps—make himself known to the Robinsons, and otherwise keep us entertained."
She met his gaze as a child might have done.
"What can I do? I've depended so much upon you. I don't like to ask too much—after this—or ever—— You've been more than kind. I didn't mean to be so helpless—or to wound your feelings, or——"
A knock at the door interrupted, and Tuttle entered the room.
Confused thus to find himself in the presence of Dorothy as well asGarrison, Tuttle snatched off his hat and looked about him helplessly.
"How are you, Tuttle?" said Garrison. "Glad to see you. Come back in fifteen minutes, will you? I want your report."
"Fifteen minutes; yes, sir," said Tuttle, and he backed from the place.
"Who was that?" said Dorothy. "Anyone connected with the case?"
"A man that Theodore hired to shadow me," said Garrison. "I took him into camp and now he is shadowing Theodore. Let me ask you one or two questions before he returns. You were ill the morning after I left, and did not go at all to Eighteenth Street."
"I couldn't go," she said. "I tried not to give up and be so ill, but perhaps the effects of the drug that the Robinsons employed caused the trouble. At last I thought you might have written to the Eighteenth Street address, so I sent around and got your letters, before I could even send a wire."
"You wired because Fairfax had appeared?"
"Yes, I thought you ought to know."
"How did you know he was here in New York? Did he call at the house where you were staying?"
"No. He sent a note declaring he would call. That was this morning. Miss Ellis's friend, of theStar, had an intuition as to who we were, that evening when he called. When I finally requested Miss Ellis to ask him not to print more stories about us, he had already spoken to the editor, and more of the matter had appeared. Since you left, however, I haven't seen a single reporter."
"Fairfax got his clew to your whereabouts from the press, of course. The question now is, where do you wish to go? And what do you wish me to do—concerning the rôle I have filled?"
Dorothy was thoroughly disturbed by the topic.
"Oh, I don't know what to do," she confessed. "I wish I could never see that man again! What do you advise?"
"We hardly know what the situation may require, till we discover more about this latest will," said Garrison. "Things may be altered materially. If you wish it, you can doubtless manage to secure a separation from Fairfax. In the meantime I would strongly advise that you rent an apartment without delay, where no one can find you again."
She looked at him wistfully. "Not even you?"
"I'm afraid you'll have to see me, once in a while," he told her, suppressing the passionate outcry of his heart, "unless you wish to secure the services of someone who will make no mistakes."
She was hurt. She loved him. Her nature cried out for the sure protection of his arms, but her womanhood forbade. More than anything else in the world she wished to please him, but not by confessing her fondness.
However much she might loathe the thought, she was the wife of Jerold Fairfax, with everything precious to guard. By the token of the wound that Garrison had inflicted, she knew that she had wounded him. It could not have been avoided—there was nothing but a chasm between them.
"Please do not make me feel that I have been utterly despicable," she pleaded. "You have made no mistakes—in the conduct of the case. I should be so helpless without you."
Garrison knew he had hurt her. He was sorry. He knew her position was the only one possible for a woman such as he could love. He reviled himself for his selfishness. He forced himself now to return her gaze with no hint of anything save business in his eyes.
"Dorothy, I shall be honored to continue with your work," he said. "I mean to see you through."
"Thank you—Jerold," she said. Her voice all but broke. She had never loved him so much as now, and because of that had given herself the one little joy of calling him thus by his name. She added more bravely: "I'll find a room and send you the address as soon as possible. Meantime, I hope we will soon discover about this latest will."
"I shall do my best," he assured her. "Let me take you now to the annex elevator, in case anyone should be waiting to see you at the other. Get yourself a heavy veil, and be sure you avoid being followed when you hunt up your room. Take the apartment in the name of Miss Root, and send me word in that name also, just for precaution. Leave Fairfax and the others to me. I may go up to Albany about the will."
He opened the door, but she hesitated a moment longer.
"I hope it will all end somehow, for the best," she said. "It's very hard for you."
He smiled, but not mirthfully.
"It was here in this room I assumed my rôle," he said, "and here I drop it."
For a moment she failed to understand.
"Drop it?" she echoed. "How?"
"I'm no longer even your pseudo-husband. I drop the name Fairfax, with all it might imply."
She blushed crimson and could not meet his gaze.
"I'm sorry if I've been the cause——" she started.
Garrison interrupted.
"I'm glad—glad of everything that's happened. We'll say no more of that. But—Theodore—how he will gloat over this!"
"If he finds out Mr. Fairfax is crazy, he could overthrow the will," suggested Dorothy. "But—what's the use of thinking of that, if a new will comes to light? It's a dreadfully mixed affair." She stepped out in the hall and Garrison led the way to the elevator farther to the rear. The chains of a car were descending rapidly.
"Please try not to detest the hour I came to see you first," she said, holding out her hand, "if you can."
"I'll try," said Garrison, holding the precious little fingers for a second over the conventional time.
Glancing up at him quickly she saw a bright smile in his eye. Joy was in her heart. The car was at the floor.
"Good-by," she said, "till we meet again—soon."
"Good-by," he answered.
She stepped in the cage and was dropped from his sight, but her last glance remained—and made him happy.