The first thing to do was to see Kittie Tayntor. Lyon had received from his kind-hearted friend in Columbus a glowing endorsement, which he had mailed to Miss Elliott, with a formal request that he might be permitted to call upon Miss Tayntor. In reply he had received a polite note, authorizing him to present himself the following Wednesday. This was encouraging, but it hardly prepared him for the more than encouraging reception which awaited him when he had duly sent up his card. A tall girl, with a fluff of light hair and eyes so dazzling that he really could not tell what color they were, came down to meet him with a pretty impetuosity.
"Oh, Cousin Percy! I'm so glad to see you! It took you the longest time to find out I was here, didn't it? I made up my mind I would never send you word to the end of time! I just thought I'd have a good joke on you when you did come around at last."
"I--I beg your pardon,--" stammered Lyon.
"Oh, I don't mind I We'll make up for lost time. I have so many things to tell you about home. When were you there last? I know you don't write often,--men never do, Aunt Meg says,--so I don't suppose you know that Cousin Jennie is engaged? To Dr. Whitman. Did you know him? No, I think you were in the east when he was there. We all like him very much."
"I'm afraid you are mista--" Lyon tried to put in, but she swept on, with the charming hurry of a breathless little brook.
"And I want to know all about your work. It must be just awfully interesting to write for the papers. I don't see how you can think of things to say! I told Miss Elliott that maybe you would help me with my compositions."
"I should be delighted, but I must--"
"She said that since you were my cousin," Kittie ran on, with a subtle emphasis, and a momentary widening of her wide eyes, "that she would be very glad to have me submit my compositions to you and get your suggestions. It is very fortunate that you are my cousin. You know if you were not, you wouldn't have been allowed to call on me at all. That's one of the rules of the school."
"Oh!" said Lyon, with sudden illumination. "I didn't know that. I'm afraid I never mentioned our relationship to Miss Elliott. I did not know that it was necessary."
"Oh, I made it all straight. I explained it to her," Kittie said, clapping her small hands inaudibly, and fairly beaming her joyous thanks upon him.
"Would the rules of the school permit you to go out for a walk with me? If I tread on dangerous ground without knowing it, you will have to put me straight. It is a glorious day, and a brisk walk would do you a lot of good."
"I don't know," Kittie murmured. "Some time, maybe,--"
"No time like to-day," said Lyon, firmly. With his best air he approached the lady who, in the far end of the reception room, had been absorbed in a volume of British Poets. "Would there be any objection to my taking my cousin out for a walk?"
"I think not," the lady said, somewhat hesitatingly.
"Then run up and put on your hat, Kittie," said Lyon, coolly. "I'll guarantee to have her back at any time you set."
"I don't quite know what Miss Elliott would say," hesitated the timid lady, "but I think you'd better be back in half an hour."
Kittie threw her arms around her neck. "You're just an angel. Miss Rose!" And she flew up to her room, while Lyon devoted himself to Miss Rose so successfully that she looked upon young men as a class more hopefully from that hour.
"Now, Cousin Kittie," said Lyon, as soon as they were outside.
"You needn't keep that up," she interrupted.
"Yes, I do," he said, firmly. "I mustn't get out of practice for a minute, or I might slip up some time. Now talk fast and tell me all the things that I really have to know."
She shot a shy glance at him under her lashes. "It was awfully nice of you to catch on so quickly."
"It was interesting, but difficult. But you are a courageous girl! Suppose I hadn't caught on?"
"I know! Wouldn't it have been awful? Or suppose you hadn't been--nice, you know! But I had to take some chances. You don't know how dreadful it is to stay shut up inside of walls like that, and never to go outside unless we go with one of the teachers, and never to see any callers unless they are relatives. And I haven't any relatives at all except Aunt Meg and Uncle Joe and Cousin Jennie at Columbus, so I never had the excitement of going downstairs to see some one in the reception room, while the girls hung over the banisters to see what he looked like when he went away." She stole a gratified glance at Lyon's straight figure and good clothes. "When Miss Elliott came to tell me about your letter, I was just wild to think that I should have to miss this splendid chance, just because you hadn't said you were a relative, so--so--"
"I see."
"Do you think it was very awful?"
"If it had been anyone else but me, it would have been awful, but since it was I, and since you are never going to do it again for anyone else,--"
"Oh, never, never!"
"I think I was in great luck," said Lyon simply. And certainly the words were well within the limit of his feelings on the subject. He had barely hoped to establish some sort of an entrée to the school. That the Miss Kittie whose name he had selected at random from the catalogue should be so pretty, so funnily absurd, so unusually entertaining, was pure gratuity on the part of Fate. And what a daringly reckless child it was! Modest as Lyon was, he couldn't help recognizing that it was luck for Kittie as well as for himself that it was he and not some one else who had been admitted so confidently to this fascinating intimacy. A dawning sense of responsibility for this irresponsible new cousin made him defer the real object of his inquiry to extend the field of his acquaintance with Kittie herself.
"How long have you been at school here. Kittie?"
"I came last September. Why?"
"Oh, I think I ought to know. Do you like it?"
"Oh, it's rather good fun," she said, cheerfully. "We have lots of spreads in our rooms and Miss Elliott has rules about everything, and that keeps us busy. Rules always make me want to go right to work to break them, just to see if I can."
"And can you?" he asked, with interest.
She looked demure. "Oh, maybe there might be some that I don't know about yet that I couldn't break."
"What are some of the rules of the school?" That was a point on which he particularly wished to post himself.
"Oh, everything. Miss Elliott won't ever let me go out walking with you like this again. Miss Rose is a new teacher. She has just come, and she didn't know."
"But I may come and see you?"
"Only on Wednesdays. But that will be quite exciting. There are very few girls who have some one come to see them every Wednesday. But maybe some Wednesdays you will be busy?" she added politely. "Of course, if you are busy, I shouldn't expect you to come. Some of the girls sometimes have flowers sent to them."
"I'm glad that's allowed," said Lyon, with an inward smile. He was trying mentally to figure out how he was going to keep in touch with Mrs. Broughton's condition if he was only allowed to visit the school once a week. That would not suit him at all. There was now only a week or eight days before the meeting of the Grand Jury, and if Mrs. Broughton's information was going to do any good at all, they must have it very soon. He must try to draw Kittie into his scheme at once, while he had this opportunity.
"Kittie, I want you to help me out about something. There is a lady visiting Miss Elliott--"
"Oh, do you know her?"
"I know who she is. And I have met her once."
"Isn't she perfectly beautiful? I should rather be like her than anyone else in the world."
Lyon smiled inscrutably, but his tongue was discreet if his eyes were not always. But instead of explaining to Kittie that Mrs. Broughton, beautiful as she was, could never hope to be as delightful as Miss Tayntor, he held himself strictly to the matter in hand.
"Mrs. Broughton is very ill, and Dr. Barry says that I must not disturb her by talking business. Now, it is very urgent that I should have a chance to talk business with her as soon as she is able to stand it,--at the very earliest moment possible. I was wondering if I could find out through you how she is getting on. I am afraid to trust Dr. Barry, you see. He will want to keep me off, and it may be too late to do any good by the time he is willing. At the same time I don't want to force myself upon her before she really is strong enough to stand it. You understand?"
"Oh, yes, indeed. I'll explain it all to her, and then she can say herself when she wants you to come."
"Are you allowed to go in to see her?" asked Lyon in surprise.
"Every evening. She likes to have me rub her head and put her to sleep."
"Oh, that's very fortunate. I thought no one was allowed to go in at all."
"No one else is. No one even goes into those halls, and we mustn't laugh or talk so that she can hear it. But the first evening when we came back after vacation, I naturally wanted to know who it was in those rooms and why she was shut up with a trained nurse and why we had to keep so specially quiet for her, so I just waited around till the nurse went down to get her supper and then I slipped in. The door wasn't locked, so it was perfectly easy. And there I found the most perfectly beautiful woman I ever saw outside of a book. You can't think how fascinated I was. I knew it was good for my education to see a lot of her, because she had such lovely manners, and I was wild to think they would come and order me out and make a rule that I must never go In again, so I just made myself as interesting to her as I possibly could. I had to hurry a lot because there wasn't much time. The nurse was liable to come back any moment."
"How interesting can you make yourself when you really give your mind to it?" asked Lyon, with lively curiosity.
"Oh,--interestingenough. It worked all right, too, because when the nurse came back, Mrs. Broughton just insisted that I should stay a little longer. She said it did her good, and she would be nervous if they didn't let me stay, and that she liked to have me there, and she got so excited that they got scared, I guess, because the nurse finally said, 'W-e-11,--' like that, you know, and so I stayed, and Iwasgood for her, too, so ever since that they let me go in for an hour in the evening, while the nurse is having her supper."
"Good. Nothing could be better. Then you can let me know the first minute that she is strong enough for me to come and see her, and particularly whether she is planning to go away. Would you be sure to know that?"
"Oh, yes. I'd see. I always see things."
"And you could send me a note?"
Kittie looked doubtful. "Miss Elliott reads all our letters, you know."
"No, I didn't know."
"That wouldn't matter, because I could write it so that she wouldn't understand, although it would be perfectly plain to you, but I am not sure she would let me write to you at all. You see, you are a rather new cousin, and if you are going to come to see me every week,--"
"She would think that was enough. I see. Well then, what can we do?"
But Kittie had a plan already evolved. "I know. My room is the corner one at the back of the house,--you can see it from this corner of the street. There, do you see the two windows with the curtains clear up? Well, so long as I leave the curtain in the right-hand window up the way it is now, it means that she is too ill to be disturbed, but if I pull it down she is getting better, and the more I pull it down, the better and stronger she is until when I pull it way down she is quite well. The other window, the one in the corner, will tell about her going away. If I see signs of her getting ready to go, I'll pull it part way down, and if it goes as low as the middle sash it means you must hurry if you want to see her, and when I pull it quite down, she has gone!"
"Kittie, you are a genius!"
"And you don't mind that it is breaking rules,--only they aren't made into rules, because nobody thought that they would be needed? I thought just a little that you didn't quite like it a while ago!"
Lyon laughed. "You are quite right, and I mustn't be superior any more. But it is very important that I should have a chance to see Mrs. Broughton,--important to other people than myself."
She gave him a demure, sidelong glance, and then dropped her eyes. "Is it about Mr. Lawrence?" she asked, ingenuously.
"You amazing young lady! What do you know about Mr. Lawrence?"
"Mrs. Broughton told me about him."
"Did she?" he asked alertly. "What did she tell you?"
"Oh, she has talked about him a great deal. He was an old friend of hers before she was married, and, just think, she had seen him only the day before all this happened."
"Did she tell you where she saw him, or what they talked about?"
"No. But she is very grateful to him for something he did for her. She says he is like a knight of old. I think if he could know she said that, he would feel proud, don't you?"
Lyon frowned thoughtfully. Mrs. Broughton's sudden sense of gratitude toward Lawrence seemed uncalled for. "What else did she say to you?"
Kittie reflected. "She said that they would never, never hang Mr. Lawrence, because nobody saw him kill Mr. Fullerton, and they couldn't hang him unless somebody swore they saw him. Is that the law?"
"I don't know much about the law, myself."
"And she says that it isn't so bad for him to be locked up for a little while, when they will have to let him go in the end, as it would be for some one to be hanged. I think that is true, too, don't you?"
In spite of the need he felt to explore her mind, the words on her lips shocked him.
"Mrs. Broughton shouldn't talk to you about such things," he said impatiently.
She lifted astonished eyes to his.
"But then I should never have known anything about it! Miss Elliott doesn't allow us to read the papers ever, and I want to know Life."
"Time enough," laughed Lyon.
"Oh, I'm not a child. I can understand. It has been a great thing for me to know Mrs. Broughton."
"She is a beautiful woman," Lyon conceded, somewhat coldly. Secretly he thought Kittie might have been as well off without that intimacy. But before he left the subject there was one point on which he wanted to get light, if possible, without betraying the point of his interest,--Mrs. Broughton's possible acquaintance with the loose panel in the protecting wall of the school yard.
"Do you know if Mrs. Broughton has been here before?" he asked.
"Oh, yes. She always stops here when she comes to Waynscott. She was one of Miss Elliott's first pupils."
"Then she knows the house and yard, pretty well?"
"Oh, of course."
"By the way, I notice that your back yard is fenced in. There is no way of getting in except by the front door, of course."
Kittie looked at him with surprise.
"When you say 'of course' in that careless way, it makes me think you mean just the opposite," she said, suspiciously.
He had to laugh at her penetration. "Then is there any other way in?" he asked.
She hesitated, and then said with an exaggerated imitation of his own "careless" manner,
"Oh,of coursenot!"
"Does Mrs. Broughton know about it, do you think?"
She pursed up her lips and nodded her head violently.
"She belongs to the Immortal Few Society. It has always been one of the things the Immortal Few learned at initiation."
"Has she spoken of it to you?"
"No."
"No, she wouldn't be apt to," Lyon reflected. Then somewhat violently he changed the subject. "Come, we won't talk about her any more. Tell me about our family, so that I won't make mistakes."
She spent the rest of the time coaching him about his newly acquired relatives, and they parted at Miss Elliot's door with mutual satisfaction.
There is no game so trying to the nerves as a waiting game. Lyon was cool by temperament and self-controlled from experience, but he found it necessary to call on both his native and acquired composure to enable him to face the situation without wanting to do something, anything, to force Fate's hand. To wait, just to sit still and wait for Mrs. Broughton to recover, while all the time Lawrence was drawing nearer and nearer to the day that would blast his career even if he escaped with his life,--it was nerve-racking. And all the time Bede was working, like a mole in the dark, undermining the wall of silence which Lawrence had thrown up. Heaven knew what he might feel bound to discover for the credit of his profession! It might prove, of course, that Mrs. Broughton had nothing bearing upon the subject to tell, but until he knew that to be the case he would hold the hope that somehow, in some way, she might clear matters up. Yes, he must wait.
And then, as he was dropping off to sleep, he woke himself up to murmur quite irrelevantly,
"Anyhow, I'm glad she didn't say that she would be a sister to me!"
But if Lyon had fancied that Fate was doing nothing merely because he had run into a blind alley himself, he soon had reason to suspect that he was mistaken. The manner in which during the next few days he stumbled against some of her threads, and so became more than ever entangled in her weaving, was curiously casual,--but as a matter of fact, most of the happenings of life seem casual at the time. It is only looking back that their connection comes into view, like a path on a far mountain, only to be seen from a distance.
Lyon had allowed himself to jubilate a little over the curtain-code which he had established with Kittie. He felt that it had the justification of being important in itself for the purpose which he and Howell had at heart, but apart from that it was so charmingly personal. The messages might concern Mrs. Broughton, but Kittie would have to give them,--and that little fact was so interesting that if he had not been a young man of much steadiness of purpose, he might have let it eclipse the significance of the message. As it was, he felt it highly important that he should be able to see those windows very frequently. Suppose Kitty should pull down a curtain and he not know about it for hours! The idea was not to be entertained calmly. Would it be possible for him to get a room in the neighborhood? He had learned in his profession that the world belongs to him who asks for it, so, selecting a house whose back windows must, from their position, command an unobstructed view of Miss Elliott's School, he boldly rang the bell. He had no idea who might live there. The house was on a lot adjoining Miss Wolcott's and, like her house, it overlooked the back windows and the grounds of the School. It was in a position that suited his needs. For the rest, he trusted to the star which had more than once favored his quiet audacity.
His ring was answered by a servant of a peculiarly uncheerful cast of countenance.
"Is your mistress at home?" Lyon asked.
"There ain't no mistress," the woman protested, in an aggrieved tone.
"Well, your master, then. Will you take up my card? I want to see him on business."
She took it and departed, with that same querulous air of dissatisfaction with the world in general.
That there was no mistress in the house was very evident, even to Lyon's uninstructed masculine sense. The reception room where he waited was dusty and musty, bearing unmistakable signs of having been closed for the summer and since left untouched. There was an echoing hollowness about the halls that seemed to proclaim the house uninhabited, in spite of the servant. While Lyon was speculating upon the situation, a thin dark middle-aged man entered the room silently and yet with an alertness that was noticeable. He looked at Lyon with sharp inquiry--almost, it struck the intruder, with distrust.
"Well?" he said curtly.
"I hope it won't strike you as cheeky," said Lyon, "but I called on the bare chance of your having a spare bedroom that you could rent me for a month,--or even less. I think my references would be satisfactory. They are going to paper my rooms at the Grosvenor, and I've got to clear out while they are messing around, and I like this part of town, so I just thought I'd see what luck I had if I went around and asked. I'm not exacting--"
"We're not renting rooms."
"I know, but as a special matter--"
"Couldn't think of it."
"Do you happen to know anyone else in the neighborhood who does?"
"Don't know anyone."
"I wish you would reconsider. It would be an accommodation to me."
"Sorry, but it's impossible." The impatience of the man's tone suggested that the interview Had lasted long enough, and Lyon rose reluctantly. He hated to feel that his inspiration had failed him. At that moment, however, the portière which separated the reception room from what appeared to be an equally musty and dusty library in the rear was pushed aside, and another man entered,--a man of impressive bearing and appearance, in spite of the fact that he wore a skullcap and a long dressing gown and that a pair of large blue goggles hid his eyes. The lower part of his face was covered with a beard and yet Lyon felt at once that here was a man of powerful personality.
"I overheard your request from the next room," he said, in a courteous but positive tone, and bowing slightly to Lyon,--who could not repress a wonder whether that position in the back room had not been taken for the express purpose of overhearing him. "I'm not sure that we cannot accommodate the young gentleman, Phillips."
Phillips looked disapproval and injury in every line of his face, but he said nothing. He had at once fallen into the attitude of a subordinate.
"You are more than kind," said Lyon, eagerly. "I know it's a great deal to ask,--but it would be a great accommodation, and I'd try to make no bother."
"You will have to judge for yourself whether there is a room that you could use. I don't know much about the house. We have only just moved in ourselves. It was a furnished house, closed for the summer, and the agent let us take it for the time being. I am in town temporarily, having my eyes treated, and I wanted a place where I could be more quiet than in a hotel. My name is Olden. This is my good friend Phillips, who looks after me generally, and thinks I ought not to increase my household. I sometimes venture to differ from him, however. The servant, whom you saw at the door, has undertaken to keep us from starving, and she would undoubtedly be able to care for your room. Now you know the family. Would you care to look at the rooms?"
"Thank you, I should like to very much," cried Lyon gayly.
It was so much better than he had had any possible grounds for expecting that his faith in his star soared up again. This was what came of venturing! And in spite of the curious sensation of talking in the dark which Mr. Olden's goggles gave him, he liked the man. There was dignity and directness in his speech, and his voice was singularly magnetic.
Olden led the way upstairs, moving with the swift confidence of a man of affairs and not at all as an invalid.
"There are four bedrooms on this floor," he said. "Phillips has one of them, and I have one. This large room at the front is unoccupied."
The room was large and attractive, but Lyon was not interested in the view toward Hemlock Avenue! He barely glanced at it.
"Might I see the other room?"
Olden opened the door to a back bedroom which, though clean, was small and in no wise so desirable as the other. But it looked the right way, and on going to the window Lyon saw that Kittie's curtains were both high up.
"This will suit me exactly," he said, eagerly. "May I have this room?"
"You really haven't looked at it very carefully," said Olden, with just the barest hint of amusement in his voice.
"Oh, well,--I--I can see that it will suit me. I shan't be in it very much, you know. I'm connected with theNews, as you know from my card. I'll be here only at night."
"Yes, it's a pleasant little room. And it has an open view. That large building is Miss Elliott's School, I am told."
"Yes, I know," laughed Lyon. "Fact is, I know one of the young ladies at the school."
"Indeed?" There was surprise and, if it had been possible to believe it, disappointment in Mr. Olden's voice. It was as though he had said, "Oh, is that it?" The blue goggles scrutinized Lyon for a moment before he said, "Well, shall we consider it settled?"
"If you please. When can I come in?"
"Whenever you like. I'll tell Sarah to make the room ready. And I hope, Mr. Lyon," he added, as they went back downstairs, "that you will sometimes join me in a cigar before you turn in. Shut in as I am, unable to use my eyes or to see people, you will be doing me a charity if you will come in and gossip a bit. Will you do it?"
"I'll be glad to," said Lyon, heartily.
"That will more than repay me, if there is any favor to you in our arrangement," the man said with a certain emphasis. He probably was lonely, Lyon reflected, with quick sympathy.
Lyon left the house much elated. When he reached the sidewalk he remembered that he had not asked for a latch-key, and that he was apt to return late. He hurried back to the door. The lock had not caught when he came out and the door stood just so much ajar that he saw Olden and Phillips in the hall, and heard Olden exclaim, with a ring of passion in his voice, "You would have thrown such a chance as that away?"
They both looked so startled, when he made his presence known, that he was swiftly aware that he was the subject of what seemed to have been a heated discussion. Evidently Phillips had protested against his admission to the household. At his suggestion about a latch-key. Olden answered,
"Why, I have only one, but I'll let you in myself whenever you ring. I'll be up, never fear."
Lyon had a busy afternoon,--for in spite of his mental absorption in matters relating to Lawrence, he was still reporting for theNewsand had to keep his assignments! He therefore had no opportunity to see Howell that day, and it was nine o'clock at night when he arrived, with his suit-case, at his new home. Olden let him in with an alacrity that suggested he had been waiting for him. This idea was also suggested by the looks of the dining room, where a tray, with bottles and glasses and a box of cigars, had been arranged alluringly within sight.
"All right, I'll be down in a minute," the new lodger said, gaily. "We'll make a night of it! Just wait till I put my suit-case in my room."
He ran upstairs to his room and looked across to Miss Elliott's School. Across the white barrenness of the snowy yard that stretched between the two houses, the light gleamed brightly from Kittie's windows. The curtain of the right window was perceptibly lower than the other. It seemed to cut off the upper third of the window. Lyon read the message with keen interest,--"Mrs. Broughton is better. She gives no signs of departure." Across the dark he blew a kiss to the unseen messenger, and hurried downstairs where his mysterious landlord was walking restlessly up and down the long dining room.
"Well, what shall we gossip about?" he asked gaily. Olden had shown no signs of physical feebleness, yet Lyon felt a hurt about him that prompted him to a show of cheerfulness beyond his habit with a stranger, and the success of his curtain code had put him into an elated mood.
"What do people generally gossip about?"
"Their friends, don't they? And their enemies; and the delinquencies of both."
"That's all right," said Olden, quickly. "Tell me about your friends and their delinquencies."
"I haven't many here. I'm a stranger myself, comparatively. The man in Waynscott I care most for, and admire most, and am sorriest for, is Arthur Lawrence."
Olden was leaning forward in an attitude of eager listening.
"That sounds like a good beginning. Will you have something--? Then have a cigar, and talk to me about Arthur Lawrence. I'm entirely a stranger in Waynscott, you know, but of course I have heard of the murder. I infer that you believe him innocent."
"Yes, I do."
"Yet I see that he was unable or unwilling to give a very clear account of his movements that evening.--Phillips read me the newspapers, and I thought it looked like a tight box for him, unless he could explain his movements somewhat."
"But he may explain them yet. Trial by newspaper is not final. There has been no chance for the real testimony, you know."
"Has gossip nothing to say on the subject?" persisted Olden. He had dropped into an arm chair and was surrounding himself with smoke, but Lyon was aware that through the smoke and the goggles which he still wore he was bending an observant eye upon his visitor.
"Gossip says many nothings. So far, nothing relevant. The murder seems to be one of these clueless mysteries which are the most difficult for the police to unravel."
"But you,--you are behind the scenes, in a fashion. Don't you know something that the public hasn't got hold of? I--I'm interested, you see."
Lyon smoked thoughtfully. The man's interest was so marked that it struck him as going beyond the bounds of ordinary curiosity. He felt that he must probe it, and so he answered with a view to keeping the subject going.
"We hear of the mysteries that are solved, but there are many more that drop from the notice of the public because they remain mysteries forever."
"Is it not possible that there may be a woman connected with the mystery?" asked Olden with a sudden hardening of his voice.
Lyon smoked deliberately a moment.
"With nothing known and everything to guess, it is difficult to say of anything that it is not possible," he answered.
"Has Lawrence's name never been connected with a woman? Is there no gossip?"
"Of the sort you suggest, nothing, I believe." Lyon's voice was calm, If his feelings were not.
"Your Mr. Lawrence is a wonder," said Olden, drily. "I hope to meet him some day. Let us drink to his release and to the confusion of the Grand Jury. A man who can keep himself free from all feminine entanglements ought to get out of a little thing like an accusation for murder without any difficulty."
"You seem to have strong feelings on the subject," said Lyon. It occurred to him that all the drawing-out need not be on Olden's side. Olden smoked a minute in silence, and then asked abruptly,
"Do you believe that women as a class have any sense of truth?"
"Oh, they must have some!"
"But do they have the same sense of honor that we have?"
"I don't know that we have enough to hurt. But you are thinking of some specific case. Suppose you give me an outline of it."
"What makes you think that?"
"Oh, we always are thinking of a woman when we generalize about women."
Olden smoked hard and in silence for a few minutes.
"I don't know whether you are right about that or not," he said finally, "but you are right in saying that I was thinking of a specific instance, and I'll be rather glad to give you an outline of it, because I should like to ask your opinion in regard to it. I think I understand men pretty well, but I never have had much to do with women. Perhaps if I had,--this is the story of a friend of mine. He told me about it just before I came on."
Lyon nodded. Possibly that might be the truth, but he would keep an open mind on the subject.
"My friend is a man past middle life,--a successful business man. He has made money and has knocked about the world a good deal, but he never fell in love until he was nearly fifty,--never had time, I suppose. Then he was hard hit. The woman was a good deal younger than he was, beautiful, and all that. He married her just as soon as he could win her consent, and was idiotically happy. For a year he thought she was happy, too. She seemed to be. Then one day she received a letter from her old home that upset her. She tried to conceal her disturbance from him, but he was too watchful of her moods to be deceived. From that moment his happiness was destroyed. His wife was concealing something from him. Other letters followed. They always had the same effect. The husband could not be blind to the fact that his wife was changed. She avoided him, withheld her confidence, and he found her more than once in tears. Perhaps it does not sound very serious, but you must remember that he was madly in love with his wife. It was serious for him."
Lyon nodded. "Did he know anything of his wife's past history,--her friends, or her--"
"Her lovers? No, he didn't. There was the sting. He simply didn't know anything. He could only see that something had come out of that unknown past to ruin his happiness."
"Why didn't he ask her, straight?"
"He did, once, and she pretended not to know what he was talking about. After that he set himself to watch. He pretended to be called away on a sudden business trip. She left, by the next train, for her old home, and went at once to the man with whom she had been corresponding."
"How did you--how did her husband know who the man was?"
"He had once found a letter, destroyed before it was finished, which enabled him to identify the man."
"Was it a love-letter?"
Olden dropped his head on his hand. "Not in terms. But it showed that this man possessed a confidence which she withheld from her husband. In it she spoke of her unhappiness in her married life as of something that he would understand,--something that they had acknowledged between them. Does that seem a little thing to you?"
"No, I can understand. Well, what did he do?"
"Nothing, yet. But I am afraid he may do something. If he should kill the man, would you say he was justified?"
"What would be the use?" asked Lyon, lightly.
"That isn't the question, when your brain is on fire. You see only one thing. The whole world is blotted out, and only that one thing burns before your eyes. I suppose that is the way one feels when going mad. Everything else blotted out, you know, except that one thing that you can't forget night or day,--awake or asleep,--" His voice was trembling with a passion that went beyond control. If Lyon had had any question that the strange man was telling his own story, he could no longer doubt it. Such sympathy is not given to the troubles of a friend.
"I understand that he has not killed the man yet?"
"No,--not yet."
"Well, then I'd advise him to wait a bit, in any event, and make sure of his facts. There's no sense in hurrying these things. Tell him to count ten. Also tell him that circumstantial evidence is the very devil. The chances are that if a thing looks so and so, that's the very reason for its turning out to be the other way. Now take this case of Lawrence's."
"Yes. What of it?" Olden had recovered himself, and he asked his question with an interest that seemed genuine, if somewhat cynical.
"The circumstantial evidence against him is pretty bad, yet you wouldn't want to have him hanged on the strength of it, would you?"
"I would not," said Olden, with a sudden laugh that sounded strange after his passion of a moment before. "I can think of nothing that I should more regret than to have your friend Lawrence hung. I drink to his speedy discharge." And he poured himself a stiff drink and drained it with a fervor that made the act seem sacrificial. Certainly there was a good deal of the original Adam in this curious stranger.
The sudden ring of the telephone in the hall cut so sharply across the silence in the house that it startled them both. Olden went to answer it, and immediately returned.
"It's someone to speak to you, Mr. Lyon,--name is Howell."
"Oh, yes. I suppose he got my new address from the Grosvenor."
He went to the phone, and this is the conversation that ensued.
Howell: "Hello, Lyon. Changed your room?"
Lyon: "Yes. I followed your suggestion."
Howell: "That's what I wanted to talk to you about. I'm getting nervous about putting off that interview with Mrs. Broughton any longer. Barry tells me she is worse. I don't want to risk waiting until it is too late. If she should die, for instance,--"
Lyon: "Barry is bluffing, to protect his patient. She is better."
Howell: "How do you know?"
Lyon: "Miss Kittie tells me she is better."
Howell: "When was that?"
Lyon: "An hour ago."
Howell: "How did you hear from her?"
Lyon: "By heliograph. We have established a code."
Howell: "You seem to have been improving the time! You think I'm safe to wait, then, a day or two? I simply must see her before she gets away, you know."
Lyon: "No sign of departure, the code said."
Howell. "And will you know if she should suddenly show signs of departure?"
Lyon: "Yes. Her curtain will be lowered. Clear down means gone."
Howell: "That will be too late."
Lyon: "She isn't likely to bolt without warning, and no one would be in better position to take note than Miss Kittie."
Howell: "All right, I'll depend on that, then. But if Bede finds her first, I'll regret my humanity."
Lyon: "I think we're safe."
Howell: "Perhaps. But not sure." And he rang off.
When Lyon returned to the dining room, he found that the door was ajar, though he had thought that he closed it after him when going to the 'phone. If his host had been curious enough to listen to one side of the conversation, Lyon hoped that he might have found it interesting. Intelligible it could hardly have been.
Lyon had carefully refrained from giving Lawrence any hint as to the new turn his suspicions had taken. He had an instinctive feeling that the masterful prisoner in the county jail would have scant patience with any unauthorized efforts on his part to penetrate the mystery. That, to Lyon's mind, might be a very good reason for not talking about his activities, but he was the last man to abandon his own line merely out of deference to another man's prejudices. He was always more interested in getting results, however, than in getting credit, so he was content to work instead of talk.
But on his next visit to Lawrence, he took occasion to put a hypothetical question which went directly to the heart of his perplexity and for which he very much wanted an answer--though he didn't expect to get it.
"Lawrence," he said, in a casual tone, having first carefully taken a position where he had the advantage of the light in watching the other man's face, "have you considered the possibility that Miss Wolcott may, after all, have had nothing to do with that affair?"
Lawrence turned upon him with swift amazement and anger.
"What do you mean?" he demanded in a threatening undertone, with an apprehensive glance at the door.
"The guard couldn't hear me to save his ears. I mean simply,--are you sure of your premises? You see, I am taking for granted that your policy of silence is to protect--oh, I won't mention her name again. But what if the facts should be that she doesn't need any protection? What if it really proves that you are making a sacrifice which is not merely heroic but is unnecessary? Suppose the woman who ran across the street was someone else?"
"Have you dared to tell--to hint--"
"What I might dare to do is one thing, what I have actually done is another. As a matter of fact, I have neither told nor hinted,--nor have I knocked you down for thinking such a thing possible."
Lawrence dropped into his chair and let his head sink on his hand.
"I beg your pardon. But it makes me wild to think how helpless I am. I can't keep Howell, for instance, from mousing around, and I can't keep Bede from peering and prying,"--
"Or me from guessing or breathing. No, you can't. Of course they may not discover anything, but even the police sometimes get hold of the right clue. You are trying to keep them from a certain clue, at a tremendous risk to yourself, and yet you don't know, you only suspect, that your silence may benefit the person I do not name."
Lawrence drummed impatiently with his fingers for a minute, and then he looked up with a direct glance into Lyon's eyes.
"Lyon, you're an awfully good fellow to have any patience with what must seem sheer unreason to you, and I wish I could be quite frank with you and make you see the situation as I do. But you are certain to be put on the witness stand yourself, so I simply can't give you any facts which you don't already know. You see that?"
"Yes,--but are they facts?"
Lawrence looked at him queerly. "What explanation do you suggest for my cane being where it was?" he asked.
"You left it somewhere,--perhaps at the state library--and Fullerton picked it up, carried it off, and had it in his hand when he was attacked."
Lawrence looked surprised and then he laughed in quick amusement.
"Ingenious, by Jove! I hope you've suggested that theory to Howell. It will give him something to occupy his mind. It would be difficult for him to prove it, but then. It would be difficult for the prosecution to disprove it--unless they should happen to discover where I actually did forget my cane."
"You mean--?"
"You can probably work it out," said Lawrence drily. "Supposing that I did mean that, don't you see that the one and only person who could throw any light on how my cane came to be where it was found is the one and only person who must not be questioned?"
"I see. But do you really think that the one and only person will maintain silence on such a matter at such a cost to you?"
"If things come to the worst, I fear the one and only person will not. My hope is that things will not come to the worst,--that there may be a disagreement or even an acquittal. Really you see, I don't feel so sure the prosecution holds a hand that leaves me no chance of coming out even. We are both bluffing, but I rather think I can bluff hardest if my flank isn't turned by my too zealous counsel."
"Still,--"
"Still, Lyon, and yet, and nevertheless, and in spite of all, I am happier than I remember ever being before in all my life, and I shall never think of this room so long as I live without feeling again the joy of a conqueror."
"May I ask why, you extraordinary man?"
"Because the one and only person has accepted my suggestion in regard to silence so sweetly. I have made several suggestions to that person, I don't mind telling you, which have not been accepted. They have been turned down hard. It seemed to have become a habit with her and I was getting discouraged. Now, the course which I suggested in this instance would not be agreeable to her. Nothing could be more opposed to her natural instinct than to keep silence if--well, under the circumstances. She has done what must have been a thousand times harder than to make even the most public explanation, she has done it for me,--because I asked her to. Now do you understand why I am happy? I'm in Paradise!"
Lyon grasped his hand in sympathetic silence, and left him. At least he had found out why Lawrence was so convinced in his own mind that Miss Wolcott was somehow implicated. Evidently it was the cane that seemed to him conclusive. He had left his cane at Miss Wolcott's and he knew it. It could have come into evidence in connection with the murder of Fullerton only through Miss Wolcott's direct or indirect agency. That was Lawrence's conviction. To protect her in any event, he was using his influence to keep her from speaking and drawing conclusions from her compliance which might be justified if his theory of her complicity was correct, but which would fall to the ground if, as a matter of fact, she was really as ignorant of the murder (and the cane) as Lyon was now inclined to believe she might be. In that case, alas for poor Lawrence! His paradise might prove but a Fool's Paradise, after all. The primary question remained, therefore, whether she really was implicated or not.
He had promised her, at their first and only interview, to call occasionally and report as to the progress of affairs, but he had deferred carrying out his promise, partly because he had nothing decisive to tell her and partly because he was rather shy of encouraging a confidence which might possibly place him in possession of embarrassing information. He did not want to learn anything that would hamper him when he was called to the witness stand, as he undoubtedly would be. But two things happened that day to make him keep his promise without further postponement.
The first was his discovery that Bede was hovering about Miss Wolcott's neighborhood. Lyon had caught a fleeting glimpse of Miss Wolcott going into a shop. A moment later he noticed Bede across the street from the shop, busily engaged in studying a display of hosiery in a show-window. He did not connect the two events at the moment, but half an hour later he met Miss Wolcott face to face, still in the shopping district. The look of suppressed pain in her eyes as she gravely bowed disturbed him so much that he walked on rather unobservantly for a few steps.
Then he was brought back to consciousness by a keen look that pierced him like a surgeon's probe as a quiet gray little man passed him. It was Bede. The significance of that piercing scrutiny flashed upon Lyon. Bede had seen him bow to Miss Wolcott and was sorting that little fact into the proper pigeon-hole in his brain. He turned to look after the detective. Bede was pausing to turn over some second-hand books on an exposed stall, and he lingered there until Miss Wolcott came out of a shop farther down the block. As she went on, Bede, who had never glanced in her direction, finished his inspection of the books and went on also. Casually, he followed the same direction she had taken. Lyon, who had lingered to observe his action, walked on very thoughtfully. That was the first thing. The second was a special-delivery letter which was brought to him that same afternoon while he was rushing to an assignment. The urgency of the outside found no counterpart in the simple little note which it enclosed: