“That’s a broad view of it,” and Judge Hoyt smiled a little, “but you run along, dear, and after a confab with Mr. Duane, I’ll come up and tell you all about it.”
The confab wound up by a trip to the office of the district attorney. The situation was too grave to allow of what Avice called “striking out”! If Landon and Mrs. Black were implicated in suspicious collusion, the matter must be sifted to the bottom.
District Attorney Whiting eagerly absorbed the new facts recounted to him, and fitted them into some he had of his own knowledge.
Landon had sent fifty thousand dollars to the mining company of Denver in which he was interested. He had not yet realized on his inheritance, for the estate had not been settled, but he had doubtless borrowed on his prospective legacy. This proved nothing, except that he had been most anxious for the large sum of money, and had utilized his acquisition of it as soon as possible.
“We must get at this thing adroitly,” counseled Judge Hoyt. “Landon is a peculiar chap, and difficult to bait. If he thinks we suspect him, he’s quite capable of bolting, I think. Better try to trip up the housekeeper. She’s a vain woman, amenable to flattery. Perhaps if Mr. Groot went to her, ostensibly suspecting,—say, Stryker,—he could learn something about her relations with Landon. And by the way, how are you going to find Stryker?”
“Through his daughter,” Whiting replied. “That butler is no more the murderer than I am; and he is hiding, because he’s afraid of that handkerchief clue.”
“It is certainly an incriminating piece of evidence,” observed Hoyt.
“It is. But not against the butler. That handkerchief is a plant. On the face of it, it is certainly too plain an indication to be the real thing. No, sir, the murderer, whoever he was, stole the butler’s handkerchief to throw suspicion on the butler. And who could do this so easily as the housekeeper, or some member of the household, who had access to Stryker’s room? Landon wasn’t at the house, that we know of, before the murder, therefore, the theory of the housekeeper bringing the handkerchief to him at their library interview, just fits in and makes it all plausible.”
“It may be,” said Judge Hoyt, looking doubtful; “it may possibly be, Whiting; but go slowly. Don’t jump at this, to me, rather fantastic solution. Track it down pretty closely, before you spring it on the public.”
“All of that, Judge Hoyt! I’ve no idea of spiking my own guns by telling all this too soon. But there’s work to be done, and first of all we must find that butler. If he can be made to think we don’t accuse him, he’ll come round, and we may learn a lot from him. We missed our chances in not questioning him more closely at first.”
Meantime Avice had gone home, and on the way, her mood had changed from sorrow to anger. She was angry at herself for having insisted on the employing of Alvin Duane. She remembered how Kane had opposed it, but she was so zealous in her hunt for justice that she ignored all objections. She was angry at Kane for hobnobbing with Eleanor Black, and also for deceiving her about their previous acquaintance. She was angry at Eleanor for knowing Kane and pretending that they were strangers. She was angry at Judge Hoyt for not dismissing Duane and obliterating even from his own memory all that stuff the detective had discovered. She was furiously angry at Duane, but that was a helpless, blind sort of rage that reacted upon herself for engaging him.
And so, her tears had dried and her quivering nerves had tautened themselves when she reached the house, and she went in, determined to attack Eleanor Black herself, and learn the truth of her acquaintance with Kane.
But as soon as she entered, she came upon Landon and Mrs. Black in the little reception room, in close confab.
“Come in,” said the widow, “come in and talk to us.”
“We won’t have time for much conversation,” said Landon, looking at his watch, “I want Mrs. Black to go out with me on an errand. May I order the car?”
“Certainly,” said Mrs. Black, smiling. “I want all my guests to feel at liberty to give any orders they choose.” Her smile included Avice and gave the girl that uncomfortable feeling that always manifested itself when the ex-housekeeper asserted herself as mistress of the place.
“Please, Avice, don’t look like that,” said Eleanor, with an injured air. “I want you to look on this house as home just as long as you choose to do so. And, indeed, you may continue in charge of it, if that is what you want.”
“Car’s here,” sang out Landon. “Come on, Eleanor.”
“Eleanor!” thought Avice, as the two went away. She had never heard him call her that before, and it struck her like a chill. And yet she felt sure there was a strong friendship, if not something deeper between them, and she must be prepared for even endearing terms.
But Avice, despite her quick anger, was of a nature born to make sacrifices. She could do anything to help those she loved, and she had suddenly realized that she did love Landon. So without thought of reward, she began to plan how she could help him.
She turned from the window without even wondering where they were going; only conscious of a vague, dull longing, that she felt now, would never be gratified.
And then, Harry Pinckney came, for one of his rather frequent calls. Avice was glad Eleanor was out as she so objected to the sight of a detective, and the young reporter had added that line of work to his own.
“I know where Stryker is,” were his first words, after they had exchanged greetings.
“You do! Where?”
“At his daughter’s. Been there all the time. That Mrs. Adler is a splendid actress, but she was a little too unconcerned about her father’s disappearance to fool me. I pinned her down, and I’m practically sure he’s in her house, or she knows where he is. But I’ve told the police and they’ll rout him out. I’m to have the scoop. I hope they find him soon.”
“And,” Avice held herself together, “who will be the next suspect?”
“Dunno. Old Groot has his eye on Kane Landon, but he’s got no evidence to speak of. I don’t care two cents for that ‘Cain’ remark. I mean I don’t for a minute think it implicates Kane Landon.”
“Bless you for that!” Avice said, but not aloud.
“However,” Pinckney went on, “they’ve got something new up their sleeves. They wouldn’t tell me what,—I’ve just come from headquarters,—but they’re excited over some recent evidence or clue.”
“Have you any reason to think it refers to Mr. Landon?”
Pinckney looked at her narrowly. “I hate to reply to that,” he said, “for I know it would hurt you if I said yes.”
“And you’d have to say yes, if you were truthful?”
“I’m afraid I should, Miss Trowbridge. Honest, now, isn’t there a chance that he is the one?”
“Oh, no, no! But, Mr. Pinckney, tell me something. Supposing, just supposing for a minute, that it might be Kane,—you know he’s been out West for five years, and out there they don’t look on killing as we do here, do they?”
“What have you in mind? A sheriff rounding up a posse of bad men, or a desperado fighting his captor, or just a friendly shooting over a card game—have you been reading dime novels?”
“No. It’s just a vague impression. I thought they didn’t call killing people murder——”
“Yes, they do, if it’s murder in cold blood. Westerners only kill in avenging justice or in righteous indignation.”
“Really? I’m glad you told me that. Do you know, Mr. Pinckney, I’m not going to sit quietly down and let Kane be accused of this thing. I don’t know whether he did it or not, but he’s going to have his chance. I know him pretty well, and he’s so stubborn that he won’t take pains to appear innocent even when he is. That sounds queer, I know, but you see, I know Kane. He is queer. If that boy is innocent, and I believe he is, he would be so sure of it himself that he’d make no effort to convince others; and he’d let himself be misjudged, perhaps, even arrested through sheer carelessness.”
“It is, indeed, a careless nature that will go as far as that!”
“It isn’t only carelessness; it’s a kind of pig-headed stubbornness. He’s always been like that.”
“And if he should be guilty?”
“Then,—” and Avice hesitated, “then, I think he’d act just exactly the same.”
“H’m, a difficult nature to understand.”
“Yes, it is. But I’m going to see that he is understood, and,—Mr. Pinckney, you’re going to help me, aren’t you?”
“To the last ditch!” and Harry Pinckney then and there, silently, but none the less earnestly, devoted his time, talent and energies to upholding the opinions of Avice Trowbridge, whatever they might be, and to helping her convince the world of their truth.
As the district attorney had surmised, Stryker was in hiding, under the protection of his daughter. Mrs. Adler was a clever young woman, and having undertaken to keep her father safe from the police investigation, she did so remarkably well.
But being assured that there was no reason for apprehension if he had not committed the murder, Stryker decided to face the music. He had feared being railroaded to jail because of his handkerchief having been found in the wood, but a certainty of fair play gave him courage, and he emerged from the house of his daughter’s neighbor, with a trembling step, but an expression of face that showed plainly relief at the cessation of strain.
“Yes, I kept father over to Mrs. Gedney’s,” said Mrs. Adler, “’cause I wasn’t going to have him all pestered up with an everlastin’ troop o’ p’licemen, when he handn’t done nothin’. I have my sick husband to nurse and wait on, and I can’t have detectives traipsin’ in here all the time. Oh, don’t talk to me about the law. I ain’t afraid. My father is as innercent as a babe, but he flusters awful easy, and a policeman after him makes him that put about, he don’ know where he’s at. So, I says, I’ll jest put him out o’ harm’s way fer a while till I see how the cat jumps.”
“But as an intelligent woman, Mrs. Adler,” began Mr. Groot, “you must know——”
“I know what I know; and I’m a wife and a daughter long ’fore I’m an intellergent woman. Don’t you come none o’ that kind of talk over me. You want my father, there he is. Now talk to him, if you can do so peaceably, but don’t give him no third degree, nor don’t fuss him all up with a lot o’ law terms what he don’t understand. Talk nice to him an’ he’ll tell you a heap more’n if you ballyrag him all to pieces!”
Groot realized the force of this argument, “talked nice” to Stryker, he learned the old man’s story.
He had been anxious to take out an insurance policy for his daughter before it became too late for him to do so; but, he affirmed, he did not kill his master for the purpose. The agent had been after him frequently, of late, to urge him to borrow the money for the premium. But this, Mrs. Adler did not want him to do, for, she argued, the interest on the loan and the premiums would counterbalance the value of the policy. They had had many discussions of the subject, for Mr. Adler, a very sick man, had wanted to die knowing that his wife had some provision for her old age. His illness precluded any insurance on his own life.
Not interested in these minute details, Groot questioned Stryker closely about the handkerchief.
“I don’t know,” Stryker said. “I don’t know, I’m sure, how my kerchief got into those woods, but I do know I didn’t take it there.”
“Could it have been taken from your room?”
“It must ’a’ been. Leastways, unless it was taken from the clothes line on a wash day,—or mebbe it blew off and was picked up by somebody passin’.”
Though not extremely probable, these were possibilities, and they had not been thought of before by Groot or his colleagues.
“There’s something in that,” he agreed, “now, Mr. Stryker, don’t get excited, but where were you Tuesday afternoon, the day that Mr. Trowbridge was killed?”
“I know all where I was, but it’s sort o’ confused in my mind. I was to the insurance agent’s; and I was to the doctor’s to be sized up for that same insurance, if I did decide to take it out; and then I dropped in to see my daughter, and her man was so sick I thought his last hour had come, and I ran over for a neighbor, and somehow I was so upset and bothered with one thing and another that the more I try to straighten out in my mind the order of those things, the more mixed up I get. You see, it was my day out, and that always flusters me anyhow. I’m not so young as I was, and the onusualness of getting into street clothes and going out into the world, as it were, makes me all trembly and I can’t remember it afterward, like I can my routine days. And then when I did go home that night, first thing I knew master didn’t come home to dinner! That never had happened before, unless we knew beforehand. Well, then Mis’ Black she ate alone, and Miss Avice, she didn’t eat at all, and there was whisperin’ and goin’s on, and next thing I knew they told me master was dead. After that nothing is clear in my mind. No, sir, everything is a blur and a mist from that time on. That there inquest, now, that’s just like a dream,—a bad dream.”
“Then,” and Groot egged him gently on, “then, about the night you left the Trowbridge house. Why did you do that?”
Stryker looked sly, and put his finger to his lips. “Ah, that night! Well, if you’ll believe me, I heard them talking in the library. You know, sir, I’ve a right anywhere on the two floors. I ain’t like the other servants, I’ve a right,—so as I was a passin’, I overheard Mr. Duane say as howIwas the murderer! Me, sir! Me, as loved my master more than I can tell you. Sir, I didn’t know what I was doing then, I just got out. I heard ’em say they had pos’tive proof, and somethin’ about a handkerchief, and I remembered the sight of that handkerchief I’d seen—oh, well, oh, Lord—oh, Lord!Ididn’t do it!” The old man’s voice rose to a shriek and Mrs. Adler exclaimed. “There now, you’ve set him off! I knew you would! Now, he’ll have hystrics, and it’ll take me all night to get him ca’med down, and me with Mr. Adler on my hands and him always worse at night——”
“Wait a minute,” commanded Groot. “I’m nearly through, and then I’ll go away and he can have his hysterics in peace. Go on, Stryker, finish up this yarn. What did you do when you heard Mr. Duane accuse you?”
Stryker looked at him solemnly and blinked in an effort to concentrate. Then he said, “Why, I pretended I’d had a telephone call from Molly, and I ran around here as fast as I could, and Molly she says, they’ll be after you, go over to Mrs. Gedney’s and stay there. And I did, till you spied me out.”
“All right,” and Groot rose to go. “Your father is all right, Mrs. Adler. Don’t coddle him too much. It makes him childish. Keep him here with you, and my word for it, no suspicion will rest on him. I had his alibi pretty well fixed up anyway, between the insurance agent and the doctor, and his story just about completes it. There isn’t one chance in a thousand that he’ll be accused, so keep him here and keep him quiet, and I’ll see you again in a day or two. But if your father tries to run away or to hide again, then hewillfind himself in trouble.”
Mrs. Adler proved amenable to these orders and Groot went away to begin his hunt for the purloiner of Stryker’s handkerchief.
“You won’t have to look far,” Whiting said, when he heard the detective’s story. “If you wanted one more thread in the strand of the rope for young Landon’s neck, that’s it. Of course, he got the handkerchief some way, whether from the housekeeper or not. Go to it and find out how.”
Indirectly and by bits, Avice learned of Groot’s discoveries, and keeping her own counsel, she worked on a side line of her own devising.
As a result, one morning when she went to see Alvin Duane with, what she felt sure he must call real evidence, he was very much interested indeed.
“I hunted and hunted all through my uncle’s desk,” she said, fairly quivering with excitement, “and at last I was rewarded by finding this. It was tucked away in a pigeon-hole, and is evidently unfinished.”
She gave Mr. Duane a slip of paper with a few typewritten words on it. The paper was torn and a little soiled, but perfectly legible. “Should I ever be found dead by some alien hand,” the paper read, “do not try to track down my murderer. I do not anticipate this event, but should it occur, it will be the work of John Hemingway. Do not search for him; he cannot be found. But his motive is a just one, and if——”
The writing ended abruptly, as if the writer had been interrupted and had never finished the tale.
“Who is John Hemingway?” asked Duane.
“I have no idea,” said Avice; “I never heard uncle speak of him. But there can be no doubt of the authenticity, as this is the writing of my uncle’s typewriter. I recognize the type.”
“Show me where you found it, Miss Trowbridge,” and going home with the girl, Duane examined the desk where she said she found the paper.
“I wonder it was overlooked so long,” he mused.
“No one has thought to go through the desk so thoroughly as I did,” she returned, with a wistful look in her eyes. “Will it save Kane?”
“It may go far toward it,” was the reply; “we must hunt up this man.”
“But my uncle says distinctly not to do that.”
“Such instructions cannot be regarded. In a case like this, he must be found.”
But no trace of the man named Hemingway could be discovered. However, the fact of the message having been written turned the tide of suspicion away from Landon to a degree, and to the best men of the force was assigned the task of discovering the identity or getting some knowledge of Hemingway.
It was a few days later that Judge Hoyt had a caller at his office. A card was brought in, on which, in straggling letters, he read:
“Terence McGuire.”
“That Fibsy!” he said, smiling at the card. “Show him in.”
So in walked Fibsy, into the office of the great lawyer, with an air of self-respect if not self-assurance.
“Judge Hoyt,” he began, without greeting; “I want to talk to you.”
“Very well, Terence, talk ahead.”
“But I want you to listen to what I say, ’thout makin’ fun o’ me. Will you?”
“Yes, I promise you that. But, I must tell you, I am a busy man, and I can’t spare much time this morning.”
“I know it, Judge; I haven’t been with Mr. Trowbridge five years fer nothin’! I know all about business.”
“You know a lot, then.”
“I mean, I know how busy a boss is, an’ how he hates to see anybuddy, ’cept by appointment, an’ all that. Yes, I’ve kep’ up with the guv’nor’s ideas, an’ I’m not the fool I look!”
Fibsy glanced up, as if surprised not to hear some humorous or sarcastic reply to this speech, but Judge Hoyt nodded, as if to a more self-evident observation.
“You see I’m aimin’ to be a big man, myself.”
“Ah, a lawyer?”
“No, sir; I’m goin’ to be a detective! I’ve got a notion to it an’ I’m goin’ to work at it till I succeed. But that’s what I came to see you about. You know this here Trowbridge murder case?”
“Yes, I know it.”
“Well, you know that feller Landon ain’t guilty.”
“Indeed, this is important information. Are you sure?”
“Now you’re makin’ fun o’ me. Well, I can’t blame you, I s’pose I am only a kid, and an ignerant one at that. But, Judge, I’ve found clues. I found ’em up on the ground, right near where they found the guv’nor’s body.”
“And what are your clues?”
“Well, when I told that Pinckney reporter about ’em, he snorted. Promise me you won’t do that, sir.”
“I promise not to snort,” said Hoyt, gravely. “Now, go ahead.”
“Well, sir, I found a button and a hunk o’ dirt.” It was with some little difficulty that the lawyer kept his promise. Though he might have used a more graceful term, he certainly felt like “snorting.” However, he only said, gravely, “What sort of a button?”
“A suspender button,” said Fibsy. And immediately he observed to himself, “Gee! I wonder why I lied then! Guess I’m born that way.”
But for some reason, he did not correct his mis-statement, and say truly, that it was a shoe button.
“Yes,” said Hoyt; “and the mud? What was the interest of that?”
“Well, you see, sir, it had a mark in it.”
“What sort of a mark?”
“The print of a boot heel.” And again Fibsy communed with himself. “Done it again!” he observed, in silent soliloquy. “Well, when I lie, onexpected, like that, I’m always glad afterward!”
Surely, the boy was well named! He had gone to Mr. Hoyt, fully intending to tell him of his “clues” and he had falsified in both instances.
Judge Hoyt was as attentive and considerate in manner as if talking to an equal.
“I know Terence,” he said, “that in the detective stories you are doubtless fond of, the eagle eyed sleuth sees a footprint, and immediately described the villain at full length. But I have never yet seen a footprint that amounted to anything as proof. Why, ninety-nine men out of a hundred would fit into the same footprint. Or, heelprint, I believe you said. Which, of course, would be even less distinctive.”
Fibsy looked at the speaker in genuine admiration. “That’s just true, sir!” he cried, eagerly. “The stories are full of footprints, but I’ve tracked out lots of ’em and I never found a good one yet.”
“Just what do you mean by ‘tracked them out’?”
“Why, I’ve watched by chance of a rainy day, when lots of men track mud into the outer office, and afterward, I fit my own shoe to ’em an’ by jiminy, sir, it fits inter every bloomin’ track!”
Hoyt looked interested. “You have gone into the subject carefully, almost scientifically.”
“Well, I’ve read such rediklus tales of such things, I wanted to see for myself. You know, I’m goin’ to be a detective.”
“If you have such ingenious views, you may succeed. But what about the button?”
“Well, you see,” and Fibsy’s face grew blank, “you can’t tell much by a suspender button, ’cause they’re all alike. If it had been a coat button, now, or——”
The judge looked at the boy thoughtfully. “Terence,” he said, “I promised not to laugh at you, and I won’t. But I think it only fair to tell you that I can’t take much interest in your ‘clues.’ But your conversation has made me realize that you’re a bright boy. Knowing that, and as you were the office boy of my very good friend, I’d like to do something for you. Have you obtained a place yet?”
“No, sir, I haven’t.”
“Well, then, I’d like to help you to get a good position. And would that wipe out your disappointment that I can’t make use of your clues?”
“Yes, sir! I’d like to have a recommendation from you, sir.”
“All right. Go away now and return this afternoon at three. I may have found a place for you by that time.”
Fibsy went away, thinking deeply. “Ain’t I the limit?” he inquired of himself. “Why in the dickens did I tell him those lies? It’s funny, but sometimes I ’spect to tell a straight yarn and sumpin inside o’ me jest ups an’ lies! But it didn’t make any difference this time fer he wouldn’t a’ cared if I’d told him it was a shoe button, or if I’d told him the truth about the hunk o’ dirt. An’ anyway, a detective has to be awful sicretive, an’ it don’t do to alwus tell the truth.”
At three the untruthful one returned for his news.
“Well, Terence,” was the greeting, “I’ve a good position for you in Philadelphia.”
Fibsy’s face fell. “I’d ruther be in New York.”
“Is that so. Well, you’re not obliged to take this place, but I should advise you to do so. It’s office boy to a first-class lawyer, and you should be able to pick up a lot of odds and ends of information that might be useful to you in your detective career.”
“Sounds good to me,” and Fibsy’s face cleared. “What’s the weekly number o’ bones?”
“You will receive ten dollars a week, if you make good.”
Fibsy almost fell over. “Gee! Mr. Hoyt, I ain’t worth it!”
“That’s for your new employer to judge. I’ve been telephoning him, and he wants a boy who is wide-awake and not stupid. You ought to fill that bill.”
“Yep, I can do that. Honest, Judge, I’ll do me best, and I’m orfly obliged, sir.”
“Not at all. Can you go this afternoon?”
“Today! Why, I s’pose I can. But it’s terrible sudden.”
“I know it. But Mr. Stetson wants to go away tomorrow, for a few days, and he wants to break you in before he leaves.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. But, oh, say, now,—I jest can’t go off so swift,—honest I can’t Judge, sir.”
“No? And why not?”
“Well, you see, I gotter get some clo’es. Yes, sir, some clo’es. And my sister, she alwus goes with me to buy ’em, an’ she can’t get a day off till tomorrow. An’ then, if the clo’es has to be let out, or let in, you know, why it’d take a little longer. Yes sir, I see now, I couldn’t get off ’fore the first of the week.”
“I’m not sure Mr. Stetson will hold the place for you as long as that.”
“Pshaw, now, ain’t that jest my luck! Can’t you pussuade him, Judge,—pussuade him, as it were?”
“I’ll try,” and smiling involuntarily, Judge Hoyt dismissed his caller.
“At it again!” said Fibsy, to himself, as he passed along the corridor. “Gee! what whoppers I did tell about them clo’es!”
“Oh, of course, that settles it” Pinckney was saying to Avice, as he watched for her answering gleam of satisfaction at his words. She had been telling him about the Hemingway letter, and had said he might use it in his newspaper story.
Avice was disappointed that the police had not been entirely convinced by the note she found, and while they searched for the unknown Hemingway, they kept strict surveillance over Kane Landon and a wary eye on Stryker.
But Pinckney agreed with her, positively, that Hemingway was the murderer, and that it was in accordance with the dead man’s wishes that he should not be hunted down, consequently the matter ought to be dropped.
However, the young reporter had reached such a pitch of infatuation for the beautiful girl, that he would have agreed to any theory she might have advanced. He lived, nowadays, only to get interviews with her, and to sanction her plans and carry out her orders. They had evolved theories and discarded them time and again, and now, Avice declared, this was the absolute solution.
“Of course, Uncle Rowland looked forward to this fate,” she said, her face saddened at the thought, and, “Of course,” Pinckney echoed.
“Seems queer, though,” put in Landon, who was present, “that the note just cropped up. Where was it, Avice?”
“In a pigeon-hole of uncle’s desk, stuffed in between a lot of old papers,—bills and things.”
“A fine search the police put up, not to find it sooner!”
“But it doesn’t matter, Kane, since I came across it,” and Avice smiled at him. “You must admit that the mystery is solved, even if we don’t know who Hemingway is, and are asked not to find out.”
“Oh, it’s as good a solution as any,” Landon said, indifferently; “but I don’t take much stock in it, and Pinck doesn’t either. Do you, old chap?”
“I see no reason to doubt that the probabilities point to the man mentioned in the note,” Pinckney returned, a little stiffly. He was horribly jealous of Landon, and though not sure that Avice cared for him, he feared that she did. Kane Landon was a handsome fellow, and had, too, as Pinckney noted with concern, that devil-may-care air that is so taking with women. It was Landon’s fad never to discuss anything seriously, and he scoffed at all theories and all facts put forth by Pinckney in his amateur detective work.
Moreover, Pinckney, who was not at all thick-skinned, couldn’t help observing how Avice’s interest in him flagged when Landon was present. Alone with the girl, the reporter could entertain and amuse her, but let Landon appear, and her attention was all for him.
So Pinckney reluctantly went away, knowing he would only be made miserable if he remained longer.
“What makes you act so about that note?” demanded Avice of Landon, after Pinckney left.
“Act how?”
“As if it were of no account. Why, Kane, if uncle wrote that, he must have known how he would meet his death.”
“Yes—,ifhe wrote it?”
“What do you mean?” Avice looked startled. “Can you have any doubt that he wrote it? Why, I know his typewriter letters as well as I know his handwriting.”
“Do you?” and Landon smiled quizzically. “Avice, you are very beautiful this morning.”
“Is that so unusual as to require comment?” The smile she flashed at him was charming.
“It isn’t unusual, but it does require comment. Oh, Avice, I wish I could kidnap you and carry you off, away from all this horrid mess of police and detectives and suspicion.”
“Would we take Eleanor Black with us?” The brown eyes looked straight at him, challenging him to declare himself for or against the one Avice felt to be a rival.
“If you like,” and Landon smiled teasingly at her. “Go on, Avice, fly in a rage, I love to see you angry.”
“’Deed I won’t! I’ve nothing to rage about. If you admire Eleanor, I can only say I admire your taste. She is certainly beautiful.”
“Bravo! Good for you, little girl! Now, just for that I’ll tell you that in my opinion she can’t hold a candle to you for beauty.”
“Your compliments are so subtle, Kane! I suppose that’s due to your western training.”
“And your sarcasm is that known as the withering variety. Oh, Avice, don’t let’s fence. Youarebeautiful, and you are very dear to me. If I weren’t—if they didn’t—oh, pshaw! if I were free of all suspicion in this horrid matter, would you,—could you——”
“Kane,” she said, looking at him seriously; “you didn’t do it, did you?”
“I will not tell you.”
“That can mean either of two things; one, which I hope, that you are innocent, and so, resent my question; the other, which I fear, that you are——”
“Guilty,” supplemented Kane.
“Yes; oh, Kane, why won’t you tell me?”
“Would you care? Avice, would you really care whether I’m guilty or not?”
The girl looked up at him, a sudden light in her big, dark eyes; “Oh, yes, Kane, I do care.”
“Do you mean it, Avice? My little girl, do you mean it!”
Impulsively, Landon took her hand, and drew her to him, looking deep into her eyes.
“Sweetheart,” he murmured, and there was a thrill in his voice Avice had never heard there before, “I will clear myself of these awful matters, and then I can ask you——”
“But, Kane, you know the note from John Hemingway——”
“Bother John Hemingway! Avice, do you take me for a fool?”
Landon crushed her to him in a desperate embrace, and then held her off and looked at her with a strange expression on his face.
“Dear heart!” he said, and gently kissing her downcast, frightened eyes he went swiftly from the room.
Going to the window, Avice watched him stride down the street. His swinging walk was a splendid thing in itself, and the girl felt a thrill of pride in the strong, well-proportioned figure, so full of life and energy.
“But I can’t understand him,” she thought, “he acts so queer every time he talks about Uncle’s death. And then, he pretends to love me,—and he’s all mixed up with Eleanor,—I wish I could get up courage to ask him about her,—but I’m—oh, I’m not really afraid of Kane—but,—well, he isstrong,—every way.”
She sank into a chair and gave herself up to day dreams.
“A bright, new, Lincoln penny for your thoughts,” said a deep voice, and Avice looked up to see Judge Hoyt smiling down at her.
For the first time in her life, she felt an aversion to him. She knew she was not in love with her elderly suitor, but always she had felt great friendship and esteem for him. Now, the esteem was still there, but the remembrance of Landon’s caress so recent, she experienced a shrinking from the passion she could not fail to read in the eyes now bent upon her.
Leslie Hoyt was a man whose physical presence dominated any group of which he was a member. Towering some inches above most of his fellow men, his fine head was carried proudly and with an air of aristocracy that gave him especial prestige. Few had ever seen his grave, scholarly face aglow with emotion of any sort, but Avice knew well the light that love kindled in those deep, dark eyes, and though not entirely responding to it, she had gratefully appreciated it, and had tacitly accepted her uncle’s plan that she should marry the judge. But that was during her uncle’s lifetime, and before Kane Landon had come home from the West.
In a swift mental picture, Avice contrasted the two men. Landon, too, was tall and big and strong. Hoyt was far superior in manner, and in that indefinable effect given by cultured associations. Landon had the advantage of youth and the careless grace of that lack of self-consciousness, so often the result of western life. The self-possession of both men was complete, but Landon’s was somewhat that of bravado and Hoyt’s that of experience.
Without detailing these thoughts to herself, Avice was quite aware of them and of their value, and she knew that she was going to choose between two of the finest specimens of men she had ever seen.
“I’m thinking about Kane Landon,” she said in answer to the remark of her new visitor. Avice was naturally mischievous, and well knew the effect of her aggravating speeches.
The kindly look in Judge Hoyt’s eyes gave way to an ironic gleam, as he said “Then I offered you full value, I think.”
“That’s so clever that I forgive its mean spirit,” and Avice smiled at him. “Yes, my thoughts were penny-wise, which is far better than if they had been pound-foolish.”
“Think pound-foolish ones of me—”
“Of you! Why, Leslie, I can’t connect you and foolishness in my mind!”
“I’m foolishly in love with you, I know that! What is there about you, Avice, that makes me lose my head entirely the moment I see you?”
“Do you really? It seems incredible! I’d like to see dignified Judge Hoyt in that state commonly described as having lost his head!”
“Would you?” and a dangerous fire blazed in Hoyt’s eyes as he took a step nearer to her.
“No, no!” cried Avice, really alarmed, “not now. I mean some other time.”
“There’ll be times enough. You’ll have to spend the rest of your life getting used to seeing me headless. But Avice, I came to talk to you about that Hemingway note.”
“Yes, do. Will it clear Kane?”
“Why?” said the lawyer, a sudden anger coming into his eyes. “Do you love him?”
Avice looked at him. “Yes,” she said simply.
“Then he shall not be cleared!” and Hoyt’s voice was full of deep hatred. “Do you know it rests with me to free him from suspicion or not! Do you know that I hold his life in my hands?”
Avice looked at him in horror. “Do you mean,” she cried “that you would let him be suspected, knowing he is innocent?”
“On the contrary,” and Hoyt looked at her meaningly, “I know the only hope of freedom Landon has, is that letter found in your uncle’s desk. And I know,—” he paused.
“You know what?” said Avice, grasping a chair for support, as she felt herself giving away.
“I know who wrote that letter.”
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean. You wrote that letter yourself. Oh, it was a fine scheme to save a guilty man, but it didn’t deceive me.”
“How do you know?”
“I know because I am familiar with all your uncle’s papers and business matters. I know, because it is not written on a style of paper that he ever used. Because it is not in his style of diction. Because, moreover, you ‘discovered’ it, just after you were told that only another suspect could save Kane Landon. And you concluded to invent that other suspect! Oh, it was clever, my girl, but it didn’t deceive me! Now, why did you do it? Because you love that man?”
Avice stood up straight and faced him. “Yes,” she cried, while her eyes shone. “Yes, that was the reason. I know he is innocent, both you and Mr. Duane declared he would not be thought so, unless there was another suspect. So Ididresort to that ruse, and I’m glad of it. It does no wrong. The man it accuses is only imaginary, and if it saves the life of an innocent man it is a justifiable deception.”
“And do you suppose I will be a party to it? Do you suppose for a minute that I will stand up for a man, knowing that my attitude is based on a falsehood?”
“Not if it is a harmless, justifiable falsehood? Not if I ask you to do it?”
“Avice, don’t tempt me. What is this man to you? You have known me for years, and along comes this stranger, and you turn to him. I won’t have it!”
“Don’t talk like that, Leslie. He doesn’t really care for me. He is in love with Mrs. Black. But she can’t save him from an awful fate, and I can, yes, and I have, if you don’t interfere with my plans. And you won’t, will you?”
Avice looked very coaxing and sweet, as she urged her plea, and Leslie Hoyt caught her in his arms. “I’ll do it,” he said, in a whisper, “if you’ll marry me at once.”
“Oh, I can’t!” and Avice shrank away from him with a gesture of aversion. “Don’t ask me that now! Wait till this awful ordeal is over.”
“That’s just it, Avice. I’m in earnest. Promise to marry me and I’ll get Landon cleared of all suspicion whether he is guilty or not.”
“Is that your price?”