Chapter XX.Marked!They finished packing the trunk, made and devoured the rarebit, and still George lingered. His mind had been jarred from its placid routine by the tragic death of their former classmate, and he dwelt upon the reminiscences which were an added torture to Storm’s perturbed mental state.The bag had been discovered, but did the porter remember checking it? Did he remember the face of the man who had given it into his charge? That was a paramount question. He had not noticed that the papers he brought home with him were not the final edition, and now it was too late to procure one even if he could get rid of George. He felt that he could not wait till morning; he must know! Dare he ask his companion for particulars? Surely it would be only natural for him to show as much casual interest as that in the mystery surrounding an old friend’s death!“What do you think about the case yourself?” he queried at last, abruptly cutting off the flow of reminiscence. “What is your theory as to how Jack came to his death?”“Well,” George helped himself to a cigar. “He may not have been killed on the Drive, you know. His body may have been brought there by automobile and thrown over the wall, and a high-powered car travels fast; the murder may have taken place miles away. I’m going down and have a look at old Jack to-morrow if they will let me—I have a theory about the whole thing that I would like to try out for my own satisfaction.”“And what is that?” Storm inquired with a jarring note of sarcasm in his tones.“Oh, I don’t pretend to be any amateur detective,” George returned mildly. “But I knew old Jack! They’re all taking it for granted that he wasn’t killed in New York because he had no business to be here; at least, he was supposed to have gone right on through. Now, his character may have steadied down and grown more dependable with the years—it must have, since he has been so uniformly trusted in such responsible positions—but you can’t change a person’s natural propensities, and Jack was always keen for a good time. Understand, I’m not casting any aspersions on him; I don’t say he would have taken a chance of trouble with that money in his care, but what if he didn’t think he was taking chances? What if he ran into some people he knew and trusted as he would himself, was persuaded to stop over and then taken unawares?”“But what grounds are there for such a supposition?” The sarcasm had gone from Storm’s tones and they were muffled and oddly constrained. “Didn’t the papers speak of a struggle? That doesn’t look as if Horton were caught off guard by people he might have been chumming with.”“That’s why I want to see the body,” responded George. “It could have been banged about and the clothes torn by that fall over the wall and down that steep, rocky incline.”“Of course,” Storm commented; “but ordinary footpads could have set upon him from behind——”“Ordinary footpads would not have known the contents of that bag,” objected the other. “Now, if he really boarded that train alive in broad daylight, he must have left it willingly, and therefore he must have done so at the terminal in New York, for no amount of persuasion or coercion would have made him get off at an intermediate station with that bag in his possession.”“And since the bag was found at the terminal, you think he was murdered there?” Storm laughed shortly.“No, but I do think he was murdered somewhere within the city limits; you couldn’t get a dead or drugged or resisting man off a train in broad daylight without attracting attention, and as a matter of fact the autopsy shows that Jack wasn’t drugged. He may have met some old pal on the train or in the station and decided to wait over for an hour or so in town before continuing on his journey, and it must have been someone he knew well. If he left Poughkeepsie on that four-something train, he must have reached New York in time for dinner, and it has been established that he wasn’t killed until around midnight. It seems to me that if the police would look up what friends of his were in New York that night, they might learn something to their advantage.”“You are getting to be quite an analyst, George; I should never have suspected it.” Storm yawned openly and tossed away his cigarette. “What about the bag? You said that when they found the man who checked it they would have Horton’s murderer. It has been established, then, that a man did check it? They have a description of him, perhaps?”He waited breathlessly for the answer, but George merely shrugged.“No. It was checked some time on Thursday; that’s all they know. The hat and pistol were in it, wadded out with newspapers, but not another scrap of evidence.” George rose. “Guess I’ll be getting on downtown. If I can get Abbott’s car to-morrow afternoon, do you want to run out somewhere for dinner? You’re not looking up to the mark lately, old man; too much brooding and sticking around by yourself. The air will do you good.”Storm assented absently, and after he had shown his visitor out he sprung the light in the bathroom and examined his face in the mirror. It bore a grayish, unhealthy pallor, and there were lines about his mouth which certainly had not been there a month before. His eyes, too: there was a look in them which Storm himself did not care to meet, and for the first time he noted a faint touch of gray in the dark hair at his temples. He shrugged and turned away.Ah, well, a few days now and he would be on his way to new fields. A few gray hairs: what did they matter? It was this ceaseless strain of being on guard, the constant rankling torture of memory! Let him once start afresh, with the past behind him, and he would soon regain his own old snap and vigor.Since that memorable Wednesday evening his rooms had become as hateful to him as the house at Greenlea. Horton had only passed a few hours there, yet he had left a vivid impression behind him as disturbing as the effect of Leila’s influence in the home. Every time Storm entered the living-room he seemed to see Horton’s figure seated in that heavy armchair, his legs stretched out luxuriously, and the smoke curling up from his cigar. The empty walls echoed with his loud, self-satisfied voice, his coarse, good-natured laugh.Storm felt that the end must come soon; he must get away, come what might, from these surroundings.The next day when he and George were bowling along the Long Island roads in Abbott’s car, he broached the subject.“Do you remember that I said some time ago I would like to chuck the trust company job and get away somewhere for a time? I’ve just about made up my mind to do it.”“Don’t be a fool, Norman!” George advised with the roughness of sudden feeling in his tones. “I know you are dragging your anchor just now, but you’ll come up in the wind all right. We all get over things in time; we have to. You would never get such a position as you have with the Mammoth Trust, and you haven’t the temperament to start out for yourself.”“I’m not dependent on that position, as it happens,” Storm remarked coldly, but his pulses leaped at the inward significance of the statement. What was fifteen thousand a year in a treadmill of precedent and prejudice to a hundred and twelve thousand and the world before him?“I know you are not, but the remains of your father’s estate won’t last you long.” George spoke with dogged patience. “You are not the sort to tie yourself down later to an inferior position where you would feel galled and embittered by the driving methods of the average commercial concern. You’ve got it pretty easy there, Norman, with the Mammoth people.”“I don’t care! I have enough for myself if I never do another stroke of work and I have no one else to consider. I want to be my own master! I want to be free!”The cry was wrung from him in an unguarded upward surge of exasperation, but George shook his head.“We are none of us that, ever,” he said slowly. “We think that we can fly from our memories, but we can’t old man. It is only from within us that resignation comes, and peace, and finally, if we are strong and patient enough, something that passes for happiness.”“How do you know all this?” Storm demanded. “Where did you get your philosophy?”“From sticking it out.” George stared straight ahead of him, and his tone was a trifle grim. “Don’t think you are the only one who has had to make the best of things and go on; I tell you, you can get used to anything in time.”“I don’t propose to!” Storm cried recklessly. “I’ve had enough of this, I tell you; I’ve got to get away!—Not permanently, you understand, but for a good long trip.”He added the latter as a sense of caution returned to him, and George retorted:“What at the end of it? You’ve got luxurious habits; there is no sense in blinking the truth. After you’ve wandered around the world lonelier than you are now and spent all your capital, you’ll come home to find your position gone and nothing in store for you. You’ve been through the worst of it; stick it out now and try to work all the harder.”“I tell you I’ve come to the end!” Storm cried desperately. “I don’t mean to be violent, old man, but I’ve got to have a change or I shall go mad! I thought if I left Greenlea and moved into town things would adjust themselves, that I should feel better; but I don’t. I haven’t the least intention of beggaring myself as you seem to think; why, I shan’t be away more than a few months at most, and I have other things in view for my return. I’ve been sticking too long at the trust company, practically rusting. I need fresh interests, a new impetus. This whole damned town stifles me!”“Then why not ask for a month’s vacation and come upstate on a fishing trip with me?” George asked after a moment. “Abbott can look after my affairs, and it isn’t too late for the trout. You used to be fond of fishing——”Storm moved impatiently in his seat.“I don’t want to do any thing I’m used to!” he declared. “I want complete change, new scenes, everything! Can’t you understand?”“I think I can.” George kept his eyes carefully trained ahead, and he seemed to be choosing his words with unusual deliberation. “But you can’t fight anything, you can’t forget anything, by running away from it, Norman.”“I’m not running away!” The denial came hotly from the other’s lips, and he eyed his companion in swift, furtive alarm. “I’m worn out and my nerves are gone; that is all there is to it! You are so confoundedly phlegmatic, George, that you could keep on in the same old rut if the heavens fell! This isn’t a wild impulse; I’ve had it in mind ever since—since Leila left me. Don’t be surprised if you hear of my pulling up stakes any day.”George had no more to say, but Storm felt uneasily that his announcement had not been received quite as he had hoped it would be. To his own mind his proposed trip seemed natural enough on the face of it, but it was evident that to his conservative friend the deliberate relinquishment of a life-long sinecure was not justified by his mere desire for a change of scene. George was not proving as easy to handle, after all, as he had anticipated; and if he thought the proposed departure strange, how would the rest of their world look upon it?But what did it matter what any of them thought? Leila’s death had been declared accidental, and that incident was closed forever, while no possible link remained to connect him with the murder of Horton. Storm told himself angrily that this utterly unwarranted apprehension showed the state his nerves were in. He must get away!That night, obsessed with the idea, he looked up sailing dates. This was the tenth of June; if he left New York on the following Saturday, the sixteenth, he could journey by rail across the continent, allow a day or two in which to look about San Francisco and catch theChikamatzufrom that port for Yokohama. It would be a simple matter to make his way from there to the China coast when Japan palled, and from there to India, to Egypt . . . .Six days more! He could possess his soul in patience for that brief period, and it would be none too long to enable him to put his affairs in final order. The investigation into Horton’s death and the disappearance of the money had reached the point which he had anticipated; now it would remain at a standstill until finally dropped for lack of further evidence. As far as he personally was concerned, the affair was over.With his decision made and the date of departure fixed in his mind, all nervous misgivings fell from him, and the news of the two succeeding days contained nothing to reawaken any disquietude.The police were noncommittal, but it was evident that they had nothing to offer in response to the clamor of the press for a report of progress in the case. The private detectives working at the behest of ‘Big Jim’ Saulsbury’s daughter and those of the Mid-Eastern Corporation were assiduously following chimerical clues. The investigation appeared to be indeed at a standstill, and Storm’s spirits soared.He even anticipated with a certain sly amusement the dinner on Tuesday evening when the wager with Millard was to be ratified in George’s presence. Those two wiseacres, with their convention-bound souls and orthodox respect for the majesty of the law, should dine calmly within arm’s length of the money the disappearance of which they would so solemnly discuss! How he would draw them out, listen to their fatuous exposition of their theories and laugh in his sleeve at them both!Homachi was eager to exhibit his culinary ability, and master and man planned a perfectly appointed little repast, the former with a nice discrimination as to wines. His guest must be in a mellow, receptive mood, for he meant to take this occasion to announce his imminent departure definitely; he could depend on Millard to spread the news about Greenlea, and the attitude in which he received it would indicate the spirit in which he would disseminate it.George was the first to appear on the scene, and his good-natured face wore a little, worried frown as he shook hands.“I heard downtown today that you had closed out your account at the bank, Norman,” he began. “You are not actually preparing to go away, are you?”“I told you on Sunday,” Storm reminded him grimly.“I know, but I—I really hoped you would think better of it.” George shook his head. “I can’t stand by without a remonstrance and see my best friend throw his whole future away on a mere restless whim. You know you are fixed for life with the Mammoth people, and no man in his senses would turn his back on an assured and ample income to gratify such a suddenly aroused desire for travel. What is it, Norman? What is on your mind?”“What do you mean?” Storm’s eyes narrowed and his voice was ominously calm. “What should be on my mind, George?”“I don’t know! Hang it, I wish I did!” the other retorted. “It just isn’t reasonable, that’s all. I don’t want to—to touch on anything that will add to your sorrow, Norman, but I can’t help feeling that there is something more in this than just an attempt to forget your grief over Leila’s death. A man might naturally hanker for new scenes, but he wouldn’t sacrifice his whole future for a few months’ change. Tell me what is at the bottom of this crazy move of yours, won’t you? I know you think I’m just a stodgy old fool, but maybe I can help.”His tone was pleading, his affectionate concern so evident, that Storm felt a twinge of compunction even as his annoyance at the other’s persistence arose.“Your attitude is not very flattering, George,” he responded coldly. “You talk as though I were an hereditary pensioner of the Mammoth Trust, as though I would not be worth my salt in any other capacity. I do not owe you or any one else an explanation of my conduct——”“Norman!” George’s face flushed with pain and mortification, and he half rose from the chair.“Sit down, old man. I know you mean this in pure friendship, but I’m not in the mood for advice.” Storm controlled himself with an effort and went on carefully. “The fact is that even if I did not contemplate this trip I should sever my connection with the trust company. There you have it straight. I’m not getting the right deal there, and I mean to branch out for myself; I should have done so long ago, but I did not want to take a chance on Leila’s account. You will forgive me if I do not discuss my future plans with you at the moment. They are not sufficiently matured, and incidentally I mean to travel for a few months. That is the whole thing in a nutshell.”“I am sorry,” George said stiffly. “I didn’t mean to butt in. I shall miss you.”The constrained tone, the wounded expression in his faithful, faded eyes only fanned his host’s dull anger; but the entrance of Millard, pompous and radiating a spirit of self-satisfied elation, brought an end to the situation.“Aha! How are you both?” the newcomer asked breezily. “Had to finesse to get off this evening; bridge party on at the house and a devil of a row over it, but it was worth it, I assure you! Great old diggings you have here, Storm! How is the real estate game, Holworthy?”The latter responded while Storm went out to the pantry to perform certain functions with a cocktail shaker. When he returned he found that the irrepressible Millard had already plunged into the subject of the wager.“Really, you know, in the interests of law and order you should drink to my victory, Storm!” the latter declared jovially.“By all means!” Storm smiled. “For the good of the commonwealth as well as to avenge the memory of the man I knew at college, I hope that Horton’s murderers will be brought to justice; but as a mere matter of personal opinion, backed by fifty dollars, I do not believe that the authorities are equal to the task.”Millard drank with a consciously superior air and then produced his wallet.“Here’s my fifty to declare that they are!” he said.“The murderersandthe money?” Storm laughed.“Andthe money!” retorted his guest.“I say, I don’t like this transaction a little bit, at least as far as my part in it is concerned,” George objected. “Holding the stakes on a bet of this sort seems scarcely decent, to me. Jack Horton was my friend.”Jokingly they overruled his scruples and went in to dinner; but from time to time Storm found himself eying Millard askance. The latter bore himself with an air of ill-concealed mystery which augmented his natural self-importance, and his knowing smile was irritating to a degree. More than once as the meal progressed he seemed on the point of volunteering a statement, but each time he checked himself, though Storm plied him assiduously with the contents of the cob-webbed bottles.Storm himself drank more than was his wont, but his brain remained clear and became if anything more coolly, keenly critical. It was evident that Millard had something which he was eager to impart, but an unusual caution weighed upon him. Was it merely a theory of his own concerning the murder, or had he really succeeded in learning anything at Headquarters which had been withheld from the public despite the taunts of the press?After the wager had been settled, Millard had sedulously avoided all reference to the crime, and Storm’s efforts to reopen the subject met with no response from him. At length the latter desisted and allowed the conversation to drift to other topics, although he kept his guests’ glasses constantly filled.George left his almost untouched, and his face grew graver as Millard’s became more flushed. Storm knew that he was brooding in his dull, ruminative fashion over the situation which Millard’s entrance had interrupted, and as the meal drew to a close he decided to make his announcement and have it over with.“I am especially glad to have you two good friends here with me to-night——” he began.“Hear! Hear!” Millard interjected.“No; this is no speech, but it is probably the last occasion on which we three shall meet for some time,” Storm pursued. “I’m leaving town in a few days—making quite an extended trip, in fact,—and I doubt if I shall be back much before it is time for George to hand me your fifty dollars, Millard.”“Going away!” Millard exclaimed blankly. “Where, old chap? What’s the idea?”“I’m not very well; nerves gone to pieces. I need a long sea voyage to buck me up, the doctor says, and I’m planning a trip to the East,” Storm explained. “When I come back I am thinking of going into something new. The Mammoth Trust is all very well, but it doesn’t offer a wide enough scope for the future. I am out after something big, but I want a rest first, and change.”Millard nodded solemnly.“Best thing for you,” he said. “Change, and all that, and then strike out for yourself. Dry rot in most of those old, conservative institutions. Hope you’ll come back to Greenlea in time for the election of the club officers in the Fall. Here’s luck, but don’t count on that fifty of mine! If you knew what I do, you’d kiss your own good-bye!”As he spoke he knocked the ash from the cigar which he had just lighted and a few flecks fell upon his host’s knee. Storm brushed them off with a quick gesture of loathing. Ashes! God, could there be something prophetic in Millard’s words?He leaned forward in his chair.“Look here, what have you got up your sleeve?” he demanded. “The bet goes as it lays, but I hope you haven’t been letting them jolly you at Headquarters into believing that you are coming out an easy winner. They always pretend secret progress when they are stalled on a case, and they are at a deadlock now.”“Deadlock, nothing!” Millard crowed, his caution forgotten at the jibe. “That’s what the chaps who did for Horton are thinking right now, but just wait till they try to pass one of those bills from the wad they stole!”“Why?” Storm was not conscious that he had spoken, that he was clutching the table edge in a grip that embedded his nails in the cloth.“Why? Because their numbers have been flashed all over the United States; the Chief of Police in every big city has been warned to be on the lookout for them, and long before the scoundrels can reach another country, provided they succeed in getting out of this one, the news will have preceded them!” Millard waved his pudgy hands excitedly. “You didn’t suppose they would give the bills out to Horton at the trust company without jotting down the numbers in case of error or accident, did you? It really wasn’t sporting of me to bet on a sure thing; but do you think now that your man has a chance of getting away with the money?”“Millard, you’re going to win!” It was George who spoke, and firm conviction rang in his tones.“Win? Hah!” Millard sat back in his chair. “The minute one of those bills makes its appearance, the man who offers it will be held for murder!”
They finished packing the trunk, made and devoured the rarebit, and still George lingered. His mind had been jarred from its placid routine by the tragic death of their former classmate, and he dwelt upon the reminiscences which were an added torture to Storm’s perturbed mental state.
The bag had been discovered, but did the porter remember checking it? Did he remember the face of the man who had given it into his charge? That was a paramount question. He had not noticed that the papers he brought home with him were not the final edition, and now it was too late to procure one even if he could get rid of George. He felt that he could not wait till morning; he must know! Dare he ask his companion for particulars? Surely it would be only natural for him to show as much casual interest as that in the mystery surrounding an old friend’s death!
“What do you think about the case yourself?” he queried at last, abruptly cutting off the flow of reminiscence. “What is your theory as to how Jack came to his death?”
“Well,” George helped himself to a cigar. “He may not have been killed on the Drive, you know. His body may have been brought there by automobile and thrown over the wall, and a high-powered car travels fast; the murder may have taken place miles away. I’m going down and have a look at old Jack to-morrow if they will let me—I have a theory about the whole thing that I would like to try out for my own satisfaction.”
“And what is that?” Storm inquired with a jarring note of sarcasm in his tones.
“Oh, I don’t pretend to be any amateur detective,” George returned mildly. “But I knew old Jack! They’re all taking it for granted that he wasn’t killed in New York because he had no business to be here; at least, he was supposed to have gone right on through. Now, his character may have steadied down and grown more dependable with the years—it must have, since he has been so uniformly trusted in such responsible positions—but you can’t change a person’s natural propensities, and Jack was always keen for a good time. Understand, I’m not casting any aspersions on him; I don’t say he would have taken a chance of trouble with that money in his care, but what if he didn’t think he was taking chances? What if he ran into some people he knew and trusted as he would himself, was persuaded to stop over and then taken unawares?”
“But what grounds are there for such a supposition?” The sarcasm had gone from Storm’s tones and they were muffled and oddly constrained. “Didn’t the papers speak of a struggle? That doesn’t look as if Horton were caught off guard by people he might have been chumming with.”
“That’s why I want to see the body,” responded George. “It could have been banged about and the clothes torn by that fall over the wall and down that steep, rocky incline.”
“Of course,” Storm commented; “but ordinary footpads could have set upon him from behind——”
“Ordinary footpads would not have known the contents of that bag,” objected the other. “Now, if he really boarded that train alive in broad daylight, he must have left it willingly, and therefore he must have done so at the terminal in New York, for no amount of persuasion or coercion would have made him get off at an intermediate station with that bag in his possession.”
“And since the bag was found at the terminal, you think he was murdered there?” Storm laughed shortly.
“No, but I do think he was murdered somewhere within the city limits; you couldn’t get a dead or drugged or resisting man off a train in broad daylight without attracting attention, and as a matter of fact the autopsy shows that Jack wasn’t drugged. He may have met some old pal on the train or in the station and decided to wait over for an hour or so in town before continuing on his journey, and it must have been someone he knew well. If he left Poughkeepsie on that four-something train, he must have reached New York in time for dinner, and it has been established that he wasn’t killed until around midnight. It seems to me that if the police would look up what friends of his were in New York that night, they might learn something to their advantage.”
“You are getting to be quite an analyst, George; I should never have suspected it.” Storm yawned openly and tossed away his cigarette. “What about the bag? You said that when they found the man who checked it they would have Horton’s murderer. It has been established, then, that a man did check it? They have a description of him, perhaps?”
He waited breathlessly for the answer, but George merely shrugged.
“No. It was checked some time on Thursday; that’s all they know. The hat and pistol were in it, wadded out with newspapers, but not another scrap of evidence.” George rose. “Guess I’ll be getting on downtown. If I can get Abbott’s car to-morrow afternoon, do you want to run out somewhere for dinner? You’re not looking up to the mark lately, old man; too much brooding and sticking around by yourself. The air will do you good.”
Storm assented absently, and after he had shown his visitor out he sprung the light in the bathroom and examined his face in the mirror. It bore a grayish, unhealthy pallor, and there were lines about his mouth which certainly had not been there a month before. His eyes, too: there was a look in them which Storm himself did not care to meet, and for the first time he noted a faint touch of gray in the dark hair at his temples. He shrugged and turned away.
Ah, well, a few days now and he would be on his way to new fields. A few gray hairs: what did they matter? It was this ceaseless strain of being on guard, the constant rankling torture of memory! Let him once start afresh, with the past behind him, and he would soon regain his own old snap and vigor.
Since that memorable Wednesday evening his rooms had become as hateful to him as the house at Greenlea. Horton had only passed a few hours there, yet he had left a vivid impression behind him as disturbing as the effect of Leila’s influence in the home. Every time Storm entered the living-room he seemed to see Horton’s figure seated in that heavy armchair, his legs stretched out luxuriously, and the smoke curling up from his cigar. The empty walls echoed with his loud, self-satisfied voice, his coarse, good-natured laugh.
Storm felt that the end must come soon; he must get away, come what might, from these surroundings.
The next day when he and George were bowling along the Long Island roads in Abbott’s car, he broached the subject.
“Do you remember that I said some time ago I would like to chuck the trust company job and get away somewhere for a time? I’ve just about made up my mind to do it.”
“Don’t be a fool, Norman!” George advised with the roughness of sudden feeling in his tones. “I know you are dragging your anchor just now, but you’ll come up in the wind all right. We all get over things in time; we have to. You would never get such a position as you have with the Mammoth Trust, and you haven’t the temperament to start out for yourself.”
“I’m not dependent on that position, as it happens,” Storm remarked coldly, but his pulses leaped at the inward significance of the statement. What was fifteen thousand a year in a treadmill of precedent and prejudice to a hundred and twelve thousand and the world before him?
“I know you are not, but the remains of your father’s estate won’t last you long.” George spoke with dogged patience. “You are not the sort to tie yourself down later to an inferior position where you would feel galled and embittered by the driving methods of the average commercial concern. You’ve got it pretty easy there, Norman, with the Mammoth people.”
“I don’t care! I have enough for myself if I never do another stroke of work and I have no one else to consider. I want to be my own master! I want to be free!”
The cry was wrung from him in an unguarded upward surge of exasperation, but George shook his head.
“We are none of us that, ever,” he said slowly. “We think that we can fly from our memories, but we can’t old man. It is only from within us that resignation comes, and peace, and finally, if we are strong and patient enough, something that passes for happiness.”
“How do you know all this?” Storm demanded. “Where did you get your philosophy?”
“From sticking it out.” George stared straight ahead of him, and his tone was a trifle grim. “Don’t think you are the only one who has had to make the best of things and go on; I tell you, you can get used to anything in time.”
“I don’t propose to!” Storm cried recklessly. “I’ve had enough of this, I tell you; I’ve got to get away!—Not permanently, you understand, but for a good long trip.”
He added the latter as a sense of caution returned to him, and George retorted:
“What at the end of it? You’ve got luxurious habits; there is no sense in blinking the truth. After you’ve wandered around the world lonelier than you are now and spent all your capital, you’ll come home to find your position gone and nothing in store for you. You’ve been through the worst of it; stick it out now and try to work all the harder.”
“I tell you I’ve come to the end!” Storm cried desperately. “I don’t mean to be violent, old man, but I’ve got to have a change or I shall go mad! I thought if I left Greenlea and moved into town things would adjust themselves, that I should feel better; but I don’t. I haven’t the least intention of beggaring myself as you seem to think; why, I shan’t be away more than a few months at most, and I have other things in view for my return. I’ve been sticking too long at the trust company, practically rusting. I need fresh interests, a new impetus. This whole damned town stifles me!”
“Then why not ask for a month’s vacation and come upstate on a fishing trip with me?” George asked after a moment. “Abbott can look after my affairs, and it isn’t too late for the trout. You used to be fond of fishing——”
Storm moved impatiently in his seat.
“I don’t want to do any thing I’m used to!” he declared. “I want complete change, new scenes, everything! Can’t you understand?”
“I think I can.” George kept his eyes carefully trained ahead, and he seemed to be choosing his words with unusual deliberation. “But you can’t fight anything, you can’t forget anything, by running away from it, Norman.”
“I’m not running away!” The denial came hotly from the other’s lips, and he eyed his companion in swift, furtive alarm. “I’m worn out and my nerves are gone; that is all there is to it! You are so confoundedly phlegmatic, George, that you could keep on in the same old rut if the heavens fell! This isn’t a wild impulse; I’ve had it in mind ever since—since Leila left me. Don’t be surprised if you hear of my pulling up stakes any day.”
George had no more to say, but Storm felt uneasily that his announcement had not been received quite as he had hoped it would be. To his own mind his proposed trip seemed natural enough on the face of it, but it was evident that to his conservative friend the deliberate relinquishment of a life-long sinecure was not justified by his mere desire for a change of scene. George was not proving as easy to handle, after all, as he had anticipated; and if he thought the proposed departure strange, how would the rest of their world look upon it?
But what did it matter what any of them thought? Leila’s death had been declared accidental, and that incident was closed forever, while no possible link remained to connect him with the murder of Horton. Storm told himself angrily that this utterly unwarranted apprehension showed the state his nerves were in. He must get away!
That night, obsessed with the idea, he looked up sailing dates. This was the tenth of June; if he left New York on the following Saturday, the sixteenth, he could journey by rail across the continent, allow a day or two in which to look about San Francisco and catch theChikamatzufrom that port for Yokohama. It would be a simple matter to make his way from there to the China coast when Japan palled, and from there to India, to Egypt . . . .
Six days more! He could possess his soul in patience for that brief period, and it would be none too long to enable him to put his affairs in final order. The investigation into Horton’s death and the disappearance of the money had reached the point which he had anticipated; now it would remain at a standstill until finally dropped for lack of further evidence. As far as he personally was concerned, the affair was over.
With his decision made and the date of departure fixed in his mind, all nervous misgivings fell from him, and the news of the two succeeding days contained nothing to reawaken any disquietude.
The police were noncommittal, but it was evident that they had nothing to offer in response to the clamor of the press for a report of progress in the case. The private detectives working at the behest of ‘Big Jim’ Saulsbury’s daughter and those of the Mid-Eastern Corporation were assiduously following chimerical clues. The investigation appeared to be indeed at a standstill, and Storm’s spirits soared.
He even anticipated with a certain sly amusement the dinner on Tuesday evening when the wager with Millard was to be ratified in George’s presence. Those two wiseacres, with their convention-bound souls and orthodox respect for the majesty of the law, should dine calmly within arm’s length of the money the disappearance of which they would so solemnly discuss! How he would draw them out, listen to their fatuous exposition of their theories and laugh in his sleeve at them both!
Homachi was eager to exhibit his culinary ability, and master and man planned a perfectly appointed little repast, the former with a nice discrimination as to wines. His guest must be in a mellow, receptive mood, for he meant to take this occasion to announce his imminent departure definitely; he could depend on Millard to spread the news about Greenlea, and the attitude in which he received it would indicate the spirit in which he would disseminate it.
George was the first to appear on the scene, and his good-natured face wore a little, worried frown as he shook hands.
“I heard downtown today that you had closed out your account at the bank, Norman,” he began. “You are not actually preparing to go away, are you?”
“I told you on Sunday,” Storm reminded him grimly.
“I know, but I—I really hoped you would think better of it.” George shook his head. “I can’t stand by without a remonstrance and see my best friend throw his whole future away on a mere restless whim. You know you are fixed for life with the Mammoth people, and no man in his senses would turn his back on an assured and ample income to gratify such a suddenly aroused desire for travel. What is it, Norman? What is on your mind?”
“What do you mean?” Storm’s eyes narrowed and his voice was ominously calm. “What should be on my mind, George?”
“I don’t know! Hang it, I wish I did!” the other retorted. “It just isn’t reasonable, that’s all. I don’t want to—to touch on anything that will add to your sorrow, Norman, but I can’t help feeling that there is something more in this than just an attempt to forget your grief over Leila’s death. A man might naturally hanker for new scenes, but he wouldn’t sacrifice his whole future for a few months’ change. Tell me what is at the bottom of this crazy move of yours, won’t you? I know you think I’m just a stodgy old fool, but maybe I can help.”
His tone was pleading, his affectionate concern so evident, that Storm felt a twinge of compunction even as his annoyance at the other’s persistence arose.
“Your attitude is not very flattering, George,” he responded coldly. “You talk as though I were an hereditary pensioner of the Mammoth Trust, as though I would not be worth my salt in any other capacity. I do not owe you or any one else an explanation of my conduct——”
“Norman!” George’s face flushed with pain and mortification, and he half rose from the chair.
“Sit down, old man. I know you mean this in pure friendship, but I’m not in the mood for advice.” Storm controlled himself with an effort and went on carefully. “The fact is that even if I did not contemplate this trip I should sever my connection with the trust company. There you have it straight. I’m not getting the right deal there, and I mean to branch out for myself; I should have done so long ago, but I did not want to take a chance on Leila’s account. You will forgive me if I do not discuss my future plans with you at the moment. They are not sufficiently matured, and incidentally I mean to travel for a few months. That is the whole thing in a nutshell.”
“I am sorry,” George said stiffly. “I didn’t mean to butt in. I shall miss you.”
The constrained tone, the wounded expression in his faithful, faded eyes only fanned his host’s dull anger; but the entrance of Millard, pompous and radiating a spirit of self-satisfied elation, brought an end to the situation.
“Aha! How are you both?” the newcomer asked breezily. “Had to finesse to get off this evening; bridge party on at the house and a devil of a row over it, but it was worth it, I assure you! Great old diggings you have here, Storm! How is the real estate game, Holworthy?”
The latter responded while Storm went out to the pantry to perform certain functions with a cocktail shaker. When he returned he found that the irrepressible Millard had already plunged into the subject of the wager.
“Really, you know, in the interests of law and order you should drink to my victory, Storm!” the latter declared jovially.
“By all means!” Storm smiled. “For the good of the commonwealth as well as to avenge the memory of the man I knew at college, I hope that Horton’s murderers will be brought to justice; but as a mere matter of personal opinion, backed by fifty dollars, I do not believe that the authorities are equal to the task.”
Millard drank with a consciously superior air and then produced his wallet.
“Here’s my fifty to declare that they are!” he said.
“The murderersandthe money?” Storm laughed.
“Andthe money!” retorted his guest.
“I say, I don’t like this transaction a little bit, at least as far as my part in it is concerned,” George objected. “Holding the stakes on a bet of this sort seems scarcely decent, to me. Jack Horton was my friend.”
Jokingly they overruled his scruples and went in to dinner; but from time to time Storm found himself eying Millard askance. The latter bore himself with an air of ill-concealed mystery which augmented his natural self-importance, and his knowing smile was irritating to a degree. More than once as the meal progressed he seemed on the point of volunteering a statement, but each time he checked himself, though Storm plied him assiduously with the contents of the cob-webbed bottles.
Storm himself drank more than was his wont, but his brain remained clear and became if anything more coolly, keenly critical. It was evident that Millard had something which he was eager to impart, but an unusual caution weighed upon him. Was it merely a theory of his own concerning the murder, or had he really succeeded in learning anything at Headquarters which had been withheld from the public despite the taunts of the press?
After the wager had been settled, Millard had sedulously avoided all reference to the crime, and Storm’s efforts to reopen the subject met with no response from him. At length the latter desisted and allowed the conversation to drift to other topics, although he kept his guests’ glasses constantly filled.
George left his almost untouched, and his face grew graver as Millard’s became more flushed. Storm knew that he was brooding in his dull, ruminative fashion over the situation which Millard’s entrance had interrupted, and as the meal drew to a close he decided to make his announcement and have it over with.
“I am especially glad to have you two good friends here with me to-night——” he began.
“Hear! Hear!” Millard interjected.
“No; this is no speech, but it is probably the last occasion on which we three shall meet for some time,” Storm pursued. “I’m leaving town in a few days—making quite an extended trip, in fact,—and I doubt if I shall be back much before it is time for George to hand me your fifty dollars, Millard.”
“Going away!” Millard exclaimed blankly. “Where, old chap? What’s the idea?”
“I’m not very well; nerves gone to pieces. I need a long sea voyage to buck me up, the doctor says, and I’m planning a trip to the East,” Storm explained. “When I come back I am thinking of going into something new. The Mammoth Trust is all very well, but it doesn’t offer a wide enough scope for the future. I am out after something big, but I want a rest first, and change.”
Millard nodded solemnly.
“Best thing for you,” he said. “Change, and all that, and then strike out for yourself. Dry rot in most of those old, conservative institutions. Hope you’ll come back to Greenlea in time for the election of the club officers in the Fall. Here’s luck, but don’t count on that fifty of mine! If you knew what I do, you’d kiss your own good-bye!”
As he spoke he knocked the ash from the cigar which he had just lighted and a few flecks fell upon his host’s knee. Storm brushed them off with a quick gesture of loathing. Ashes! God, could there be something prophetic in Millard’s words?
He leaned forward in his chair.
“Look here, what have you got up your sleeve?” he demanded. “The bet goes as it lays, but I hope you haven’t been letting them jolly you at Headquarters into believing that you are coming out an easy winner. They always pretend secret progress when they are stalled on a case, and they are at a deadlock now.”
“Deadlock, nothing!” Millard crowed, his caution forgotten at the jibe. “That’s what the chaps who did for Horton are thinking right now, but just wait till they try to pass one of those bills from the wad they stole!”
“Why?” Storm was not conscious that he had spoken, that he was clutching the table edge in a grip that embedded his nails in the cloth.
“Why? Because their numbers have been flashed all over the United States; the Chief of Police in every big city has been warned to be on the lookout for them, and long before the scoundrels can reach another country, provided they succeed in getting out of this one, the news will have preceded them!” Millard waved his pudgy hands excitedly. “You didn’t suppose they would give the bills out to Horton at the trust company without jotting down the numbers in case of error or accident, did you? It really wasn’t sporting of me to bet on a sure thing; but do you think now that your man has a chance of getting away with the money?”
“Millard, you’re going to win!” It was George who spoke, and firm conviction rang in his tones.
“Win? Hah!” Millard sat back in his chair. “The minute one of those bills makes its appearance, the man who offers it will be held for murder!”