Reaching The Haven, Colonel Ashley, who had trailed LeGrand Blossom to the latter's boarding place without anything having developed, was met by Shag, who was up later than usual, for it was now close to midnight.
“What now, Shag!” exclaimed the colonel. “Don't tell me there are any more detective cases for me to work on. I simply won't listen. I wish I hadn't to this one. It's getting more and more tangled every minute, and the fish are biting well. Hang it all, Shag, why did you let me take up this golf course mystery?”
“I didn't do it, Colonel, no, sah!”
“What's the use of talking that way, Shag! You know you did!”
“Yes, sah, Colonel. Dat's whut I did!” confessed Shag with a grin. When the colonel was in this mood there was nothing for it but to agree with him.
“And it's the worst tangle you ever got me into!” went on Shag's master. “There's no head or tail to it.”
“Den it ain't laik a fish; am it?” asked Shag, with the freedom of long years of faithful service.
“No, it isn't—worse luck!” stormed the colonel. “I never saw such a case. The diamond cross mystery was nothing like it.”
“But I thought, Colonel, sah, dat de mo' of a puzzle it were, de bettah yo' laiked it!” ventured Shag.
Colonel Ashley tried to repress a smile.
“Get to bed, you black rascal!” he said with an affectionate pat on Shag's back. “Get to bed! What are you staying up so late for, anyhow?”
“To gib yo' a message, Colonel, sah,” answered Shag. “Miss Viola done say I was t' wait up, an', when yo' come in, t' tell yo' dat she wants t' see you.”
“Oh, all right. Where is she?”
“In de liberry, Colonel, sah!”
The detective made his way through the dimly-lighted hall, and, on tapping at the library door, was bidden by Viola to enter.
“Still up?” he asked. “It was time for you to be asleep long ago if you want your eyes to keep as bright as they always are.”
“They don't feel very bright,” she answered, with a little laugh. “They seem to be full of sticks. But I wanted to ask you something—to consult with you—and I didn't want to go to sleep without doing it. I want you to read these,” and she spread out before him the letters she had found hidden in the drawer of the safe.
Colonel Ashley, in silence, looked over one document after another, including the torn ones. When he had finished he looked across the table at Viola.
“What do you make of it?” she asked. “I don't know,” he frankly confessed. “But we must find out if your father owed the captain anything—for money advanced in an emergency, or for anything else. Who would know about the money affairs?”
“Mr. Blossom. He has full charge of the office now, and access to all the books. Aunt Mary and I have to trust to him for everything. It is all we can do.”
“Yes, I suppose so,” agreed the detective. And he did not speak of the scene of which he had recently been a witness.
“Then if you will come with me, we will go the first thing in the morning to father's office and see LeGrand Blossom,” decided Viola. “We will ask Mr. Blossom if he knows anything about the debt between my father and Captain Poland.”
“It would be wise, I think.”
And as the colonel retired that night he said, musingly:
“Another angle, and another tangle. I must read a little Izaak Walton to compose my mind.”
So he opened the little green book and read this observation from the Venator:
“And as for the dogs that we use, who can commend their excellency to that height which they deserve? How perfect is the hound at smelling, who never leaves or forsakes his first scent, but follows it through so many changes and varieties of other scents, even over and in the water, and into the earth.”
“Ah,” mused the colonel, “I think I must cling to my first scent, and follow it through or over the water or into the earth.”
Then, laying aside the little green book, with its atmosphere of calm delight, he picked up a little thin volume, which bore on its title page “The Poisonous Plants of New Jersey.”
And in that he read:
“The water hemlock (Cicuta maculata L.) is the mostpoisonous plant in the flora of the United States, and hasprobably destroyed more human lives than all our othertoxic plants combined. As a member of the parsley family(Umbellifera) it resembles in general appearance the carrotand parsnip of the same group of plants. It grows in swampyland. The poisoning of the human is chiefly with the fleshyroots.“The active principle of this cicuta is the volatilealkaloid canine, common also to the poison hemlock (Coniummacula turn L.) The symptoms of the poisoning are many,including violent contraction of the muscles, dilated pupilsand epilepsy... No antidote for canine poisoning is known...The active canine... was the poison employed by the Greeksin putting prisoners to death, Socrates being one of itsillustrious victims.”
And having read that much, Colonel Ashley looked at a little slip in the book. It bore the penciled memorandum “58 C. H.—~161*.”
“I wonder—I wonder,” mused the colonel, and so wondering, and with fitful dreams attending his slumbers, he passed the night.
Jean Forette drove the colonel and Viola to the office. They arrived rather early. In fact LeGrand Blossom was not yet in, and when he did enter, a few minutes later, he was plainly surprised to see them.
“Is anything the matter?” asked the confidential clerk, as he quickly opened his desk. “I am sorry I was late this morning. But I had some matters to look after—”
“No apology necessary,” said Colonel Ashley, quickly. “We have not been waiting long. We have discovered something.”
If his life had depended on it LeGrand Blossom could not, at that moment, have concealed a start of surprise.
“You mean you have found out who killed Mr. Carwell?” he asked, and his tongue went quickly around his dry lips.
“Not that,” the colonel answered. “But we have found some letters that seem to need explaining. Here they are.”
Then when Viola had told how she discovered them, she asked:
“Did my father ever owe Captain Poland any money?”
“Yes,” answered LeGrand Blossom, frankly, “he did.”
“How much?”
“Fifteen thousand dollars.”
“Was it ever paid back?” asked Colonel Ashley.
“That I cannot say,” replied the head clerk. “The papers in that particular transaction are missing. I looked for them the other day, but failed to find them. I was intending to ask you, Miss Carwell, if you knew anything about them. Now, it seems you do not. The fact remains that your father was at one time indebted to the captain for fifteen thousand dollars. Whether it was repaid I can not say.”
“Who would know?” asked Colonel Ashley.
“Why, Captain Poland, of course,” answered Mr. Blossom. “One would think that it would be paid by check, but in that case the canceled one would come back from the bank, which it has not. It is possible that Mr. Carwell had an account in some other bank, or he may have paid the captain in cash. In either case a receipt would be given, I should say. Captain Poland is the only one who now would know.”
“Then we had better see him,” suggested Colonel Ashley. “Shall we call on him, Viola?”
She hesitated a moment before answering, and then replied in a low voice:
“I think it would be better. We must end this mystery!”
They left LeGrand Blossom and again entered the car. Jean Forette was driving, and the detective again noticed the strange and sudden change in his manner. Whereas he had been morose and sullen the first part of the trip, timid and watchful of every crossing and turning, now he put on full speed and drove with the confidence of an expert.
“He must have had another shot of dope,” mused the colonel. “I'll have to keep an eye on you, my Frenchie, else you may be ramming a stone wall when you're feeling pretty well elated.”
They were half way to the home of Captain Poland when Viola suddenly changed her mind.
“I—I don't believe I care to go to see him,” she said. “Can't you go without me, Colonel Ashley? You can find out better than I can. I—I really don't feel equal to it.”
“Of course, I can,” was the ready answer. “Drive Miss Carwell home, Jean, and then I'll go on to see Captain Poland myself.”
The car was swung around, and was soon in front of The Haven. The colonel, with his usual gallantry, walked with Viola to the steps. As the maid opened the door she said to her mistress:
“There is a lady to see you.”
“A lady to see me?” exclaimed Viola, in some surprise.
“Yes. She is in the library, waiting. I said I did not know how long you would be away, but she said she was a friend of the family and would wait.”
“Who is she?” asked Viola.
“I don't know. But she is a large, blonde lady.”
“I can't imagine,” murmured Viola. “Won't you come in, Colonel Ashley? It may be some one I would want you to see, also.”
As Viola, followed at a little distance by the colonel, entered the library, a large, blonde woman arose to meet her.
“I am so glad to see you, my dear Miss Carwell,” began the woman, and then Colonel Ashley had one of his questions answered. The voice was the same as that of the shawled woman LeGrand Blossom had met on the ferryboat the night before, and it was the voice of Annie Tighe, alias Maude Warren, alias Morocco Kate, one of the cleverest of New York's de luxe crooks.
“So you have a hand in the game, have you, my dear?” mused the colonel, as he caught the now well-remembered tones. “Well, I guess you don't want to see me right away, and I don't want you to.”
He had kept behind Viola during the walk down the hall, and the large blonde had not noticed him, he hoped. He whispered to Viola, who stood just at the entrance to the room:
“Learn all you can from her. I'll be back pretty soon—as soon as she has gone. Find out where she's stopping. Don't mention me.”
The hall was dimly lighted, and he had a chance to say this to Viola without getting into full view of the caller, and without her overhearing. Then, turning quickly, Colonel Ashley hurried out of the house.
“Morocco Kate,” he mused as he got into the car again, and told Jean to drive to Captain Poland's. “Morocco Kate! I wonder if she is just beginning her game, or if this is merely a phase of it, started before Mr. Carwell's death? Another link added to the puzzle.”
He was still pondering over this when he reached the captain's home. It was a rather elaborate summer “cottage,” with magnificent grounds, and the captain's mother kept house for him. But there was a curious deserted air about the place as Jean drove up the gravel road. A man was engaged in putting up boards at the windows.
“Is the captain here?” asked the colonel.
“The place is being closed for the season, sir,” answered the man, evidently a caretaker.
“Closed? So early?” exclaimed the colonel, in surprise.
“The captain has gone away,” the man went on. “I got orders yesterday to close the place for the season. Captain Poland will not be back.”
“Oh!” softly exclaimed the colonel. And then to himself he added: “He won't be back! Well, perhaps I shall have to bring him back. Another link! There may be three people in this instead of two!”
“So sweet of you to see me, Miss Carwell, in all your grief, and I must apologize for troubling you.”
Miss Tighe, alias Morocco Kate, fairly gushed out the words as she extended a hand to Viola in the library. The first glance at the “large blonde,” as the maid had described her, shocked the girl. She could hardly repress a shudder of disgust as she looked at the bleached hair. But, nerving herself for the effort, Viola let her hand rest limply for a moment in the warm moist grip of Miss Tighe.
“Won't you sit down?” asked Viola.
“Thank you. I won't detain you long. I called merely on business, though I suppose you think I'm not a very business-like looking person. But I am strictly business, all the way through,” and she tittered. “I find it pays better to really dress the part,” she added.
“I was so sorry to hear about your dear father's death. I knew him—quite well I may say—he was very good to me.”
“Yes,” murmured Viola, and somehow her heart was beating strangely. What did it all mean? Who was this—this impossible person who claimed business relations, yes, even friendliness, with the late Mr. Carwell?
“And now to tell you what I came for,” went on Miss Tighe. “Your dear father—and in his death I feel that I have lost a very dear friend and adviser—your dear father purchased many valuable books of me. I sell only the rarest and most expensive bindings, chiefly full morocco. Your father was very fond of books, wasn't he?”
Viola could not help admitting it, as far as purchasing expensive, if unread, editions was concerned. The library shelves testified to this.
“Yes, indeed, he just loved them, and he was always glad when I brought his attention to a new set, my dear Miss Carwell. Well, that is what I came about now. Just before his terrible death—it was terrible, wasn't it? Oh, I feel so sorry for you,” and she dabbed a much-perfumed handkerchief to her eyes. “Just before his lamented death he bought a lovely white morocco set of the Arabian Nights from me. Forty volumes, unexpurgated, my dear. Mind you that—unexpurgated!” and Morocco Kate seemed to dwell on this with relish. “As I say, he bought a lovely set from me. It was the most expensive set I ever sold—forty-five hundred dollars.”
“Forty-five hundred dollars for a set of books!” exclaimed Viola, in unaffected wonder.
“Oh, my dear, that is nothing. These were some books,” and she winked understandingly.
“It isn't everybody who could get them! The edition was limited. But I happened on a set and I knew your father wanted them, so I got them for him. He made the first payment, and then he died—I read it in the papers. Naturally I didn't want to bother you while the terrible affair was so fresh, so I waited. And now I'm here!”
She seemed to be—very much so, as she settled herself back in the big leather chair, and made sure that her hair was properly fluffed around her much-powdered face.
“You are here to—” faltered Viola. “To get the balance for the books—that's it, dear Miss Carwell. Naturally I'm not in for my health, and of course I don't publish books myself. I'm only a poor business woman, and I work on commission. The firm likes to have all contracts cleaned up, but in this case they didn't press matters, knowing Mr. Carwell was all right; or, if he wasn't, his estate was. I've sold him many a choice and rare book—books you don't see in every library, my dear. Of course there were—ahem—some you wouldn't care to read, and I can't say I care much about 'em myself. A good French novel is all right, I say, but some of 'em well, you know!” and she winked boldly, and dabbed her face with the handkerchief which was quickly filling the room with an overpowering odor.
“You mean my father owes you money?” faltered Viola.
“Well, not me, exactly—the firm. But I don't mind telling you I get my rake-off. I have to so I can live. The balance is only three thousand dollars, and if you could give me a check—”
“Excuse me,” interrupted Viola, “but I have nothing to do with the business end of my father's affairs.”
“You're his daughter, aren't you?”
“Yes.”
“And you'll get all his property?” Morocco Kate was getting vindictive now.
“I cannot discuss that with you,” said Viola, simply. “All matters of business are attended to at the office. You will have to see Mr. Blossom.”
“Huh! LeGrand Blossom! No use seeing him. I've tried. But I'll try again, and say you sent me.” The voice was back to its original dulcet tones now. “That's what I'll do, my dear Miss Carwell. I'll tell LeGrand Blossom you sent me. He needn't think he can play fast and loose with me as he has. If he doesn't want to pay this bill, contracted by your father in the regular way—and I must say he was very nice to me—well, there are other ways of collecting. I haven't told all I know.”
“What do you mean?” demanded Viola hotly. “Oh, there's time enough to tell later,” was the answer. “I haven't been in the rare edition business for nothing, nor just for my health. But wait until I see LeGrand Blossom. Then I may call on you again!” And with this rather veiled threat Morocco Kate took her leave.
“What horrible person was that?” asked Miss Mary Carwell, who met Viola in the hail after her visitor's departure. “She was positively vulgar, I should say, though I didn't see her.”
“Oh, she was just a book agent. I sent her to Mr. Blossom.”
“To Mr. Blossom, my dear! I didn't know he was literary.”
“Neither was this person, Aunt Mary. I think I shall go and lie down. I have a headache.”
And as she locked herself in her room shed bitter tears on her pillow. Who was this person who seemed to know Mr. Carwell so well, who boasted of how “good” he was to her? Why did Colonel Ashley want to gain all the information he could about her?
“Oh, what does it all mean?” asked Viola in shrinking terror. “Is there to be some terrible—some horrible scandal?”
She put the question to Colonel Ashley a little later.
“Who is this woman?”
The colonel considered a moment before replying. Then, with a shrewd look at Viola, he replied:
“Well, my dear, she isn't your kind, of course, but I've known her, and known of her, for several years. She, and those she associates with, work the de luxe game.”
“The de luxe game? What is it?”
“In brief, it's a blackmailing scheme. A woman of the type of Miss Tighe, to give her one of her names, associates herself with some men. They arrange to have a set of some books—usually well known enough and of a certain value—bound in expensive leather—full morocco—hand tooled and all that. They call on rich men and women, and induce them to buy the expensive and rare set, of which they say there is only one or two on the market.
“Sometimes the sales are straight enough—particularly where women are the buyers—but the books, even if delivered, are not worth anything like the price paid.
“But, in the case of wealthy men the game is different.”
“Different?”
“Yes, particularly where a woman like Morocco Kate is the agent. They are not satisfied with the enormous profit made on selling a common edition of books, falsely dressed in a garish binding, but they endeavor to compromise the man in some business or social way, and then threaten to expose him unless he pays a large sum,—ostensibly, of course, for the books.
“Morocco Kate, who called on you, has more than one killing to her credit in this game, and she has managed to keep out of jail because her victims were afraid of the publicity of prosecuting. And it was so foolish of them for, in most cases, it was just mere foolishness on their part, and nothing criminally, or even morally, wrong, though they may have been indiscreet.”
“And you think my father—”
“I don't know anything about it, Viola, my dear!” was the prompt answer. “Your father may have dealt in a legitimate way with this woman, buying books from her because she cajoled him into it, though he could have done much better with any reputable house. As I say, he may have simply bought some books from her, and not have made the final payments on account of his death. Whether the contract he entered into is binding or not I can't say until I have seen it.”
“But I found nothing about books among his papers!”
“No? Then perhaps it was a verbal contract. Or he may have been—” The colonel stopped. Viola guessed what he intended to say.
“Do you think he was—Do you think this woman may make trouble?” she asked bravely.
“I don't know. We must find out more about her. If she comes again, hold her and send for me. I didn't want her to see me to-day to know that I was on this case. But I don't mind now.”
“Oh, suppose there should be some—some disgrace?”
“Don't worry about that, Viola. But now, I have some rather startling news for you.”
“Oh, more—”
“Not exactly trouble. But Captain Poland has gone away—his place is closed.”
“The captain gone away!” faltered the girl.
“Yes. I wondered if you knew he was going. Did he intimate to you anything of the kind?”
The colonel watched Viola narrowly as he asked this question.
“No, I never knew he contemplated ending the season here so early,” Viola said. “Usually he is the last to go, staying until late in October. Is there anything—”
“That is all I know—he is gone,” said the detective. “I wanted to ask him about that fifteen-thousand-dollar matter, but I shall have to write, I suppose. And the sooner I get the letter off the better.”
“Please write it here,” suggested Viola, indicating the table where pens, ink and stationery were always kept. “I am going to look again among the papers of the private safe to see if there was anything about books—the Arabian Nights, she said it was.”
“Yes, that's her favorite set. But don't worry, my dear. Everything will come out all right.”
And as Viola left him alone in the library, the detective added to himself:
“I wonder if it will?”
Colonel Ashley wrote a brief, business-like letter to Captain Poland, addressing it to his summer home at Lakeside, arguing that the yachtsman would have left some forwarding address.
Then, lighting a cigar, the colonel sat back in a deep, leather chair—the same one Morocco Kate had sat in and perfumed—and mused.
“There are getting to be too many angles to this,” he reflected. “I need a little help. Guess I'll send for Jack Young. He'll be just the chap to look after Jean and follow that French dope artist to his new place, provided he leaves here suddenly. Yes, I need Jack.”
And having telephoned a telegram, summoning from New York one of his most trusted lieutenants, Colonel Ashley refreshed himself by reading a little in the “Compleat Angler.”
Jack Young appeared at Lakeside the next day, well dressed, good looking, a typical summer man of pleasing address.
“Another diamond cross mystery?” he asked the colonel.
“How is your golf?” was the unexpected answer.
“Oh, I guess I can manage to drive without topping,” was the ready answer. “Have I got to play?”
“It might be well. I'll get you a visitor's card at the Maraposa Club here, and you can hang around the links and see what you can pick up besides stray balls. Now I'll tell you the history of the case up to the present.”
And Jack Young, having heard, and having consumed as many cigarettes as he considered the subject warranted, remarked:
“All right. Get me a bag of clubs, and I'll see what I can do. So you want me to pay particular attention to this dope fiend?”
“Yes, if he proves to be one, and I think he will. I'll have my hands full with Blossom, Morocco Kate and some others.”
“What about Poland and Bartlett?”
“Well, Harry is still held, but I imagine he'll be released soon, Jack.”
“Nothing on him?”
“I wouldn't go so far as to say that. You know my rule. Believe no one innocent until proved not guilty. I can keep my eye on him. Besides, he's pretty well anchored.”
“You mean by Miss Viola?”
“Yes.”
“How about the captain?”
“He's a puzzle, at present. But I wish you'd find out if that chauffeur has a girl. That's the best way to do, or undo, a man that I know of. Find out if he has a girl. That'll be your trick.”
“All right—that and golf. I'm ready.”
And Jack Young worked to such good advantage that three days later he had a pretty complete report ready for his chief.
“Jean Forette has a girl,” said Jack; “and she's a little beauty, too. Mazi Rochette is her name. She's a maid in one of the swell families here, and she's dead gone on our friend Jean. I managed to get a talk with her, and she thinks he's going to marry her as soon as he gets another place. A better place than with the Carwells, she says he must have. This place was pretty much on the blink, she confided to me.”
“Or words to that effect,” laughed the colonel.
“Exactly. I'm not much on the French, you know. Still I got along pretty well with her. She took a notion to me.”
“I thought you might be able to get something in that direction,” said the colonel with a smile. “Did you learn where Jean was just prior to the golf game which was the last Mr. Carwell played?”
“Yes, he was with her, the girl says, and she didn't know why I was asking, either, I flatter myself. I led around to it in a neat way. He was with her until just before he drove Mr. Carwell to the links. In fact, Jean had the girl out for a spin in the new car, she says. She's afraid of it, though. Revolutionary devil, she calls it.”
“Hum! If Jean was with her just before he picked up Carwell to go to the game—well, the thing is turning out a bit different from what I expected. Jack, we still have plenty of work before us. Did I tell you Morocco Kate was mixed up in this?”
“No! Is she?”
“Seems to be.”
“Good night, nurse! Whew! If he fell for her—”
“I don't believe he did, Jack. My old friend was a sport, but not that kind. He was clean, all through.”
“Glad to hear you say so, Colonel. Well, what next?”
They sat talking until far into the night.
There was rather a sensation in Lakeside two days later when it became known that the coroner's jury was to be called together again, to consider more evidence in the Carwell case.
“What does it mean?” Viola asked Colonel Ashley. “Does it mean that Harry will be—”
“Now don't distress yourself, my dear,” returned the detective, soothingly. “I have been nosing around some, and I happen to know that the prosecutor and coroner haven't a bit more evidence than they had at first when they held Mr. Bartlett.”
“Does that mean Harry will be released?”
“I think so.”
“Does it mean he will be proved innocent?”
“That I can't say. I hardly think the verdict will be conclusive in any case. But they haven't any more evidence than at first—that he had a quarrel with your father just before the fatal end. As to the nature of the quarrel, Harry is silent—obstinately silent even to his own counsel; and in this I can not uphold him. However, that is his affair.”
“But I'm sure, Colonel, that he had nothing to do with my father's death; aren't you?”
“If I said I was sure, my dear, and afterward, through force of evidence and circumstance, were forced to change my opinion, you would not thank me for now saying what you want me to say,” was the reply. “It is better for me to say that I do not know. I trust for the best. I hope, for your sake and his, that he had nothing to do with the terrible crime. I want to see the guilty person discovered and punished, and to that end I am working night and day. And if I find out who it is, I will disclose him—or her—no matter what anguish it costs me personally—no matter what anguish it may bring to others. I would not be doing my full duty otherwise.”
“No, I realize that, Colonel. Oh, it is hard—so hard! If we only knew!”
“We may know,” said the colonel gently.
“Soon?” she asked hopefully.
“Sooner than you expect,” he answered with a smile. “Now I must attend the jury session.”
It was brief, and not at all sensational, much to the regret of the reporters for the New York papers who flocked to the quiet and fashionable seaside resort. The upshot of the matter was that the chemists for the state reported that Mr. Carwell had met his death from the effects of some violent poison, the nature of which resembled several kinds, but which did not analyze as being any particular one with which they were, at present, familiar.
There were traces of both arsenic and strychnine, but mingled with them was some narcotic of strange composition, which was deadly in its effect, as had been proved on guinea pigs, some of the residue from the stomach and viscera of the dead man having been injected into the hapless animals.
Harry Bartlett was not called to the stand, but, pale from his confinement, sat an interested and vital spectator of the proceedings.
The prosecutor announced that the efforts of his detectives had resulted in nothing more. There was not sufficient evidence to warrant accusing any one else, and that against Harry Bartlett was of so slender and circumstantial a character that it could not be held to have any real value before the grand jury nor in a trial court.
“What is your motion, then?” asked the coroner.
“Well, I don't know that I have any motion to make,” said Mr. Stryker. “If this were before a county judge, and the prisoner's counsel demanded it, I should have to agree to a nolle pros. As it is I simply say I have no other evidence to offer at this time.”
“Then the jury may consider that already before it?” asked Billy Teller.
“Yes.”
“You have heard what the prosecutor said, gentlemen,” went on the coroner. “You may retire and consider your verdict.”
This they did, for fifteen minutes—fifteen nerve-racking minutes for more than one in the improvised courtroom. Then the twelve men filed back, and in answer to the usual questions the foreman announced:
“We find that Horace Carwell came to his death through poison administered by a person, or persons, unknown.”
There was silence for a moment, and then, as Bartlett started from his seat, a flush mantling his pale face, Viola, with a murmured “Thank God!” fainted.
Harry Bartlett walked from the court a free man, physically, but not mentally. He felt, and others did also, that there was a stain on him—something unexplained, and which he would not, or could not, clear up—the quarrel with Mr. Carwell just before the latter's death. And even to Viola, when, in the seclusion of her home, she asked Harry about it after the trial, or rather, the verdict, he replied:
“I can not tell. It was nothing that concerns you or me or this case. I will never tell.”
And Colonel Ashley, hearing this, pondered over it more and more.
The little green book was all but forgotten during these days, and as for the rods, lines, and reels, Shag arranged them, polished them and laid them out, in hourly expectation of being called on for them, but the call did not come. The colonel was after bigger fish than dwelt in the sea or the rivers that ran into the sea.
It was a week after the rather unsatisfactory verdict of the coroner's jury that Bartlett, out in his “Spanish Omelet,” came most unexpectedly on Captain Gerry Poland, some fifty miles from Lakeside. The captain was in his big machine, and he seemed surprised on meeting Bartlett.
“Oh!” he exclaimed. “Then you are—”
“Out, at any rate,” was the somewhat bitter reply. “Where have you been, Gerry?”
“Away. I couldn't stand it around there.”
“I suppose you know they have been looking for you?”
“Looking for me? Oh, you mean Colonel Ashley wanted some information about certain business matters. Well, I didn't see that I owed him any explanation about private matters between Mr. Carwell and myself, so I didn't answer.
“You know what the imputation is, Gerry?” questioned Bartlett, as each man sat in his car, near a lonely stretch of woods.
“I don't know that I do,” was the calm reply.
“Well, Viola has told me of the finding of the papers in her father's private safe. I told her I would see you, if I could, and get an explanation. I did not think I would find you so soon.”
“I didn't know you were looking, Harry, or I would have come to you. What do you mean about papers in a private safe?”
“I mean those which indicate that Mr. Carwell owed you fifteen thousand dollars.”
“Well, he did owe me that,” said the captain calmly.
“He did?” and Harry Bartlett accented the last word.
“Yes, but it was paid. He did not owe me a dollar at the time of his death.”
“That is astonishing news! There is no record of the money having been paid!”
“Nevertheless the debt is canceled,” insisted the captain. “I sent the receipt and the canceled note to LeGrand Blossom.”
“It's false!” cried Bartlett. “He hasn't any such documents!”
For a moment Captain Poland seemed about to leap from his car and attack the man who had given him the lie direct. Then, by an effort, he composed himself, and quietly answered:
“I can prove every word I say, and I will take immediate steps to do so. Mr. Carwell paid me the fifteen thousand dollars on the twenty-third, and I—”
“He paid you the money on the twenty-third? the very day he died?” cried Harry.
“Yes.”
“Then—Why, good heavens, man! Don't you see what this means? It means you were with him just before his death, the same as I was. We're both in the same boat as far as that goes!”
“Yes, I admit that I was with him, and that he paid me the fifteen thousand dollars shortly before his unfortunate end,” returned Captain Poland. “But our meeting was a most peaceful one, even friendly, and—”
“You mean that I—Oh, I see!” and Bartlett's voice was full of meaning. “So that's what you are driving at. Well, two can play at that game. I've learned something, anyhow!”
There was a grinding of gears, and the “Spanish Omelet” shot away. Captain Poland watched it for a moment, and then, with a shrug of his shoulders, threw in the clutch and speeded down the road in the opposite direction.
Harry Bartlett lost no time in acquainting Colonel Ashley with the admission made by Captain Poland.
“So the wind is veering,” the detective murmured. “I shall watch him. I wondered why he didn't answer my letters. Now we must see LeGrand Blossom.”
“I'll come with you,” offered Bartlett. “I want to see this thing through now. Shall we tell her?” and he motioned toward Viola's room.
“Not now. We'll see Blossom first.”
If the head clerk was perturbed at all by the visit to the office of Colonel Ashley and Harry Bartlett, he did not disclose it. He welcomed the two visitors, and took them to his private room.
Colonel Ashley went bluntly into the business in hand.
“Have you any papers to show that Captain Poland acknowledged the receipt of the fifteen thousand dollars owed to him by Mr. Carwell?”
“I have not,” was the frank answer. “I have been searching for something to prove that the debt was paid, as I knew of its contraction. It was not canceled as far as I can find.”
“Yet Captain Poland says it was paid,” said Bartlett, “and that he sent you the receipt.”
“I never got it!” insisted LeGrand Blossom. Harry Bartlett and Colonel Ashley looked at one another, and then the detective, with an effort at cheerfulness which he did not feel, said:
“Oh, well, perhaps in the confusion the papers were mislaid. I shall ask Viola about them. Another search must be made.”
And so the two went back to The Haven, not much more enlightened than when they left it.
“'What is to be done?” asked Bartlett. “Blossom says he knows nothing of it.”
“Then I must know a little more about Mr. Blossom,” mentally decided the colonel. “I think I shall shadow him a bit. It may prove fruitful.”
And when two nights later LeGrand Blossom left his boarding place and met a veiled woman at a lonely spot on the beach, Colonel Ashley, who had been waiting as he so well knew how to do, hid himself on the sand behind some sedge grass and began to think that the game was coming his way after all.
“For a man who pretends to be open and above board, his actions are very queer,” mused the detective, as he silently crawled nearer to where LeGrand Blossom and the woman stood talking in low tones on the lonely sands. “I don't see what object he could have in making away with Carwell, and yet it begins to look black for him. Maybe there is more than the fifteen thousand dollars involved. There are so many angles to the case now. I must find out who this woman is.”
And when she spoke in louder tones than usual, drawing from LeGrand Blossom an impatient “Hush!” the colonel had his answer.
“Morocco Kate again! What's her part now?”
The detective was near enough now to hear some of the talk.
“Did you bring it?” asked the woman eagerly.
“Hush! can't you?” snapped LeGrand Blossom.
“Pooh! What's the harm? There's no one in this lonely place! It gives me the creeps. Li'l ole Broadway for mine!”
“You never know who's anywhere these days!” muttered LeGrand. “That infernal detective seems to be all over. He looks at me—oh, he looks at me, and I don't like it.”
Morocco Kate laughed.
“Shut up!” ordered the head clerk. “Do you think this is funny?”
“It used to be,” was the answer. “It used to be funny, when you thought you were in love with me. Oh, it was delicious!”
“I was a bigger fool than I ever thought I'd be!” growled LeGrand Blossom.
“You aren't the only one,” was the consoling answer. “But what I'm interested in now, is—did you bring the mazumma—the cush—the dope?”
“All I could get,” was the answer. “I'm in a devil of a mess, and the estate hasn't been settled yet. I may get some more out of it then, but you'll have to quit bleeding me. I'm through with you, I tell you!”
“But I'm not with you,” was the sharp rejoinder. “I'll take this now, but I'll need more. The game isn't going as it used to. Mind, I'll need more, and soon.”
“You won't get it!”
“Oh, won't I? Well, there are others that'll pay well for what I'm able to tell, I guess. I rather think you'll see me again, Lee. So-long now, but I'll see you again!”
She moved off in the darkness, laughing mirthlessly, and with muttered imprecations LeGrand Blossom turned in the opposite direction, passing within a few feet of the hidden detective. “Blackmail, or is it a division of the spoils?” mused Colonel Ashley. “I've got to find out which. Mr. Blossom, I think I'll have to stick to you until you fall into the sear and yellow leaf.”
The next day as Colonel Ashley sat trying to fix his attention on a passage from Walton, a messenger brought him a note. It was from a young man who, at the colonel's suggestion, had been given a clerical place in the office of the late Horace Carwell. Not even Viola knew that the young man was one of the colonel's aides.
“Blossom just sent out a note to a Miss Minnie Webb,” the screed, which the colonel perused, read. “He's going to meet her in the park at Silver Lake at nine to-night. Thought I'd let you know.”
“I'm glad he did,” mused the detective. “I'll be there.”
And he was, skillfully though not ostentatiously attired as a loitering fisherman of the native type, of which there were many in and about Lakeside.
The fisherman strolled about the little park in the center of which was a body of fresh water known as Silver Lake. It was little more than a pond, and was fed by springs and by drainage. In the park were trees and benches, and it was a favorite trysting spot.
Up and down the paths walked Colonel Ashley, his clothes odorous of fish, and he was beginning to think he might have his trouble for his pains when he saw a woman coming along hesitatingly.
It needed but a second glance to disclose to the trained eyes of the detective that it was none other than Minnie Webb, whom he had met several times at the home of Viola Carwell. Minnie advanced until she came to a certain bench, and she stopped long enough to count and make sure that it was the third from one end of a row, and the seventh from the other end.
“The appointed place,” mused the colonel as he sauntered past. And then, making a detour, he came up in the rear and hid in the bushes back of the bench, where he could hear without being observed—in fact the bench was in such shadow that even the casual passerby in front could not after darkness had fallen tell who occupied it.
Minnie Webb sat in silence, but by the way she fidgeted about the colonel, hearing the shuffling of her feet on the gravel walk, knew she was nervous and impatient.
Then quick footsteps were heard coming along through the little park. They increased in sound, and came to a stop in front of the bench on which sat the shrouded and dark figure of the girl.
“Minnie?”
“LeGrand! Oh, I'm so glad you came! What is it? Why did you send me a note to meet you in this lonely place? I'm so afraid!”
“Afraid? Lonely? Why, it's early evening, and this is a public park,” the man answered in a low voice. “I wanted you to come here as it's the best place for us to talk—where we can't be overheard.”
“But why are you so afraid of being overheard?”
“Oh, things are so mixed up—one can't be too careful. Minnie, we must settle our affairs.”
“Settle them? You mean—?”
“I mean we can't go on this way. I must have you! I've waited long enough. You know I love you—that I've never loved any one else as I've loved you! I can't stand it any longer without you. I have asked you to marry me several times. Each time you have put it off for some reason or other. Now we must settle it. Are you going to marry me or not? No matter what your folks say about me and this Carwell affair. Do you—do you care for me?”
The answer was so low and so muffled that the colonel was glad he could not hear it.
“Confound it all!” he murmured, “that's the worst of this business! I don't mind anything but the love-making. I hate to break in on that!”
There was an eloquent silence, and then LeGrand Blossom said:
“I am very happy, Minnie.”
“And so am I. Now what shall we do?”
“Get married as soon as possible, of course. I've got to wind up matters here, and as soon as I can I may take up an offer that came from Boston. It's a very good one. Would you go there with me?”
“Yes, LeGrand. I'd go anywhere with you—you know that.”
“I'm glad I do, my dear. It may be necessary to go very soon, and—well, we won't stop to say good-bye, either.”
“Why! what do you mean,” and the hidden detective knew that the girl had drawn away from the young man.
“Oh, I mean that we won't bother about the fuss of a farewell-party. I'm not tied to the Carwell business. In fact I'd be glad to chuck it. There's nothing in it any more, since there's no chance for a partnership. We'll just go off by ourselves and be happy—won't we, Minnie?”
“I hope so, LeGrand. But must we go away? Can't you get something else here?”
“I think we must, yes.”
“You haven't had trouble with—with Viola, have you?”
“No. What made you think of that?”
“Oh, it was just a notion. Well, if we have to leave we will. I shall hate to go, however. But, I'll be with you—” and again the words were smothered.
“I wonder what sort of a double-cross game he's playing,” mused the colonel when the two had left the park and he, rather stiff from his position, shuffled to the lonely spot where he had before made a change of garments. Attired as his usual self, he went back to The Haven, and spent rather a restless night.
Minnie Webb was perplexed. She loved LeGrand Blossom—there was no doubt of that—but she did not see why he should have to leave the vicinity of Lakeside where she had lived so many years—at least during the summer months. All her friends and acquaintances were there.
“I wonder if Viola has given him notice to leave since she came into her father's property,” mused Minnie. “I'm going to ask her. He may never get such a good place in Boston as he has here. I'll see if I can't find out why he wants to leave. It can't be just because father does not care much for him.”
So she called on Viola, as she had done often of late, and found her friend sitting silent, and with unseeing eyes staring at the rows of books in the library.
“Oh, Minnie, it was so good of you to come! I'm very glad to see you. Since father went it has been very lonely. You look extremely well.”
“I am well—and—happy. Oh, Viola, you're the first I have told, but—but Mr. Blossom has—asked me to marry him, and—”
“Oh, how lovely! And you've said 'yes!' I can tell that!” and Viola smiled and kissed her friend impulsively. “Tell me all about it!”
“And so it's all settled,” went on Minnie, after much talk and many questions and answers. “Only I'm sorry he's going to leave you.”
“Going to leave me!” exclaimed Viola. Her voice was incredulous.
“Well, I mean going to give up the management of your business. I'm sure you'll miss him.”
“I shall indeed! But I did not know Mr. Blossom was going to leave. He has said nothing to me or Aunt Mary about it. In fact, I—”
“Oh, is there something wrong?” asked Minnie quickly, struck by something in Viola's voice.
“Well, nothing wrong, as far as we know. But—”
“Oh, please tell me!” begged Minnie. “I am sure you are concealing something.”
“Well, I will tell you!” said Viola at last. “I feel that I ought to, as you may hear of it publicly. It concerns fifteen thousand dollars,” and she went into details about the loan, which one party said had been paid, and of which Blossom said there was no record.
“Oh!” gasped Minnie Webb. “Oh, what does it mean?” and, worried and heartsick, lest she should have made a mistake, she sat looking dumbly at Viola...