The moment we drew up before the house, McKelvie sprang out and disappeared from view. I switched off the motor and clambered out to find Jenkins waiting for me. He nodded in the direction of the grounds and as I had no mind to hunt for McKelvie I was on the point of ascending the steps when he appeared suddenly from behind a clump of bushes.
"Just taking stock of the general atmosphere, as it were," he said, waving his hand in the direction of the grounds, which made me take a second look at my surroundings.
My first visit had not been conducive to leisurely inspection and I now saw that the house was exceedingly unusual, a replica of the relic of a bygone age, although by no means so very old itself. It had been modeled after a type of dwelling that is now obsolete, but which was much in vogue when the English held sway over the Island of Manhattan, and was a massive affair with the servants' wing tacked on at the back like an after-thought (which it probably was, since it looked newer than the original domicile), and connected with the main building by a narrow enclosed passageway.
The entire structure, including the garage in the rear, stood directly in the center of the vast grounds, and was completely screened from the view of the curious by the forest of trees that surrounded it. It was an odd house, and it is a great pity it is no longer standing, but in a way I can hardly blame the heirs for having had it torn down and a modern home built on the site, since it must forever have remained coupled in their minds with associations which we who were in any way connected with the events which took place in that house, were all of us endeavoring to forget.
"Only two things to be learned here," said McKelvie. "First, that it would be easy for anyone to enter or leave the grounds unnoticed on a dark night."
"And it was dark that night, beastly dark," I interrupted.
"And secondly, that there is more space occupied by the left side of the house than by the right."
He pointed to the building and I saw what he meant. The left side jutted out almost beyond the steps. The right side was cut off level with the topmost gradient and in line with the front door.
"What a curious way to build a house," I remarked. "What's the interpretation, McKelvie?"
His answer was to spring up the steps and ring the bell. He waited a few minutes, then hearing no sound rang again.
"It's no good," said McKelvie, with a shrug, after our third attempt to rouse the inmates. "They've probably deserted the ship. It's a habit with servants when things go wrong in a house. Jenkins, go around back and see if you can unearth the butler. He can be depended upon to have remained behind. Tell him that Mr. Davies wishes to enter the house."
As Jenkins disappeared, McKelvie continued: "Strange that Orton hasn't the gumption to find out what's wanted."
"He left the house for good after the inquest," I returned. "I doubt if there is anyone living here now."
"What about young Darwin?"
"Lee? The last I heard of him he had gone South."
"Lee Darwin gone South?" he repeated. "How do you know?"
"I forgot to mention it last night, but when I first called on you I also went to the Yale Club. They told me Lee had left for the South the previous afternoon. At the time I thought it queer that he should go so soon after the murder, without waiting to attend his uncle's funeral."
"It was odd. I'll have to start somebody on his trail at once. Did you know that he was here the night of the murder?"
"Here in the house?" I gasped.
"No. Outside the study window," he returned.
"But McKelvie," I answered, thinking to trip him, "that footprint was made by Lee Darwin in leaving the study."
"What footprint?" He stared at me in evident surprise.
"I understood you to mean that you had deduced Lee's presence from the footprint that Jones discovered," I returned abashed.
He laughed heartily. "My dear man, where are your reasoning powers? Footprints don't last forever and we have had a shower since the murder. Besides I'm not clairvoyant enough to guess by a look at the imprint whose shoe made it. No, I base my deduction on this."
He held up a stick-pin of a peculiar dull brown hue, made in the shape of the head of a bulldog. On the gold setting around the base of the head had been engraved the name, L. Darwin.
"Where did you find it?" I asked eagerly, as he slipped it into his wallet.
"Beneath the first two windows of the study the ivy has grown very thickly. I found the pin close to the wall and directly beneath the second window, entangled in the vine. The head is exactly the color of the ivy stem and it had remained unnoticed. I saw it because I was hoping to find proof of his presence there."
"But I do not see how you could possibly know he had been there," I objected.
"I've learned to read between the lines and I spent the night in thoroughly acquainting myself with the inquest. Besides, Mr. Davies, you have a very retentive mind and you told me more than you guessed last night. One of the things you emphasized was the fact that Lee Darwin had seemed to know that his uncle was dead when he saw the coroner, and that he had turned deathly pale when suddenly accused of being outside the study that fatal night. You ended by saying that although that point was cleared up to everyone's satisfaction you were still persuaded that the young man knew more than he gave out, and I agree with you there."
"But if he witnessed events, why doesn't he clear Ruth then?" I protested.
"I didn't say he saw anything. I merely said he was there," he retorted, and refused to discuss the point further, which was just as well perhaps, for Jenkins was holding the door open and there was much to be done if McKelvie was to clear Ruth before her trial.
As we entered I noticed Mason hovering in the background, and I nodded to him. "Mason, this gentleman is a detective who has come to solve the mystery of your master's death. I should be obliged if you would let him in whenever he comes here."
"Yes, sir, indeed I will, sir. Master was my master and I'm not saying anything against the dead, sir, but I'd like to see someone else swing for it, indeed I would, sir," he said in a troubled whisper.
"Thank you, Mason. That is all. If we need you we shall call you."
He moved slowly toward the servants' entrance and I turned to look for McKelvie. He had been examining the lock of the front door, and now he was employed in measuring the respective distances of the stairs and the drawing-room door from that of the study. As Mason disappeared, however, McKelvie looked up at me with a smile.
"Ready?" he inquired, and when I nodded he opened the door of the study with an eager air and the light of battle in his eyes.
I had expected to see him whip out a lens and begin a minute examination of the room. Instead he adjusted the chair in the position in which it had stood on the fatal night, and seating himself in, closed his eyes.
This procedure did not at all impress me as the right way to go about solving the crime, when every moment was precious. I was on the point of remonstrating with him when Jenkins enjoined silence upon me.
"He's thinking, sir," he said low.
Thinking! I was thoroughly disgusted. With my intimate knowledge of the case thinking for five consecutive days had brought me nowhere, yet here was this man whom I had engaged to find clues and investigate the murder thoroughly, sitting back in a chair thinking—goodness knows about what, since all the thinking in the world would not produce the tangible material evidence of which we stood in such dire need!
"Jenkins!" McKelvie sat up with a suddenness that startled me. "Open that safe."
As Jenkins knelt before the huge contraption and manipulated the dial with deft fingers, McKelvie turned to me with a quizzical smile.
"Don't become annoyed, Mr. Davies," he said quietly. "Each man his own method, you know. I was just trying to decide a certain small point and now that I have satisfied myself as to my correctness in the matter, I'll be as energetic as anyone could possibly wish."
I felt the blood surge into my cheeks, as I said a little stiffly, "I didn't mean to criticize——"
"No harm done," he interrupted lightly, rising and laying a hand on my arm for a moment. Then he addressed my man. "You're mighty slow for an adept, Jenkins."
"An adept! Jenkins!" I could hardly articulate the words.
"A former adept in the art of safe-cracking," answered McKelvie with a flourish. "But I trust you won't count that against him since he reformed some years ago."
"No, of course not," I murmured hastily, as Jenkins looked up at me with pleading in his somber eyes. "He's a very good servant, whatever else he may have been."
With a beaming smile Jenkins rose and opened the door of the safe.
"Now," said McKelvie, "I'm going to show you several curious, but rather interesting facts."
He turned to the lamp upon the table and gazed at it thoughtfully for a moment, then he snapped it on and off. "Did you notice anything odd about it?" he asked.
In imitation of his manner, I too gazed steadily at the lamp. I had paid no great attention to it before, being too overwrought to notice details, but now I saw, or thought I saw, what he meant.
In keeping with the style of the room, the lamp though small was made in the shape of a bacchante who wore on her hair a crown of leaves and about her bare shoulders a wreath of the grapevine, so exceedingly heavy that she held it away from her graceful body with her hands, from which depended a rather large cluster of magnificent grapes.
"It is very beautiful," I responded, "but odd for a lamp, and that bunch of grapes seems almost out of all proportion to the rest of the figure."
"True, but that is not what I referred to," he returned. "Look here!"
Again he pulled the cord which cleverly imitated a stray tendril clinging to the wreath, and a pleasant glow suffused the table, but much as I looked I could detect nothing amiss.
McKelvie smiled involuntarily at my anxious endeavor to discover the flaw. "Don't you see that the light comes from the right side of that cluster and not from the center?" he remarked. "Which means a double socket of course. Why then doesn't the other bulb light also?"
"There may be no bulb in the left-hand socket," I suggested. "Or it may be broken."
He nodded. "We'll soon settle that." He unscrewed the bunch of grapes and revealed the double socket, each part of which was provided with a bulb. He exchanged the bulbs and when he pulled the cord the same condition obtained. Only the bulb on the right lighted.
"It isn't broken, you see. Therefore, it must be lighted from some other source. I divined as much when Mrs. Darwin declared she hadn't touched it, and that if it had been lighted from the table she would have seen the person who pulled the cord. The only thing remaining is to find the switch that operates it."
Without a moment's hesitation he made for the safe and I followed him hastily. Now that I was in front of it I saw that the safe was nothing but a closet containing three shelves, which were built into the side walls at such a height that by stooping slightly a man could pass under them with ease. I glanced along the lowest shelf, although I knew that it was empty since Jones' entrance at the inquest, but McKelvie paid no attention to the bareness of the cupboard. He was engrossed in fingering the wall beyond the door. Then with a grunt of satisfaction he caught my hand and placed it where his had been. Instantly my fingers came in contact with a small button. I pushed it, and lo! the left bulb of the lamp sprang suddenly into being.
"Well, I'll be hanged!" I ejaculated, looking at McKelvie. "Why does any sane person want to light his lamp from his safe?" I asked.
"Because, Mr. Davies, it's no more a safe than I am—well—Jenkins," he returned impressively.
"Not a safe?" I exclaimed.
"No."
"Then what—?"
"I'm going to show you." McKelvie again fingered lightly the wall, but this time it was the wall which formed the back of the safe.
Presently with that same peculiar grunt he took out a pocket-flash and a knife. Opening the knife he pried the point into what looked by the aid of the flash like a harmless knot-hole just beneath the lowest shelf. (He was kneeling on the floor of the safe and Jenkins and I were stooping to watch him.) The next moment the knot-hole had swung aside, revealing to our astonished gaze a tiny key-hole!
The back of the safe was in reality a door!
Silently we watched as McKelvie fished out his keys and tried them in the lock but without success. Then he spoke to Jenkins. "Tell Mason to give you all of Mr. Darwin's keys, but don't let him come in here."
"Very well, sir."
When Jenkins returned with the keys McKelvie tried them in the lock, one after the other, but the door remained as securely locked as before.
"Strange," he said, looking annoyed. "You are sure you brought me all the keys?" he added abruptly.
"Yes, sir, even the ones he had in his pocket when he was shot, sir," responded Jenkins.
"Odd. I hate to break it open. It might be useful later on."
Jenkins, who had been peering intently at the key-hole over McKelvie's shoulder, spoke suddenly. "No need to smash it, sir. I still have my old tool kit and if I'm not mistaken I have a master key that will fit this lock."
"Off with you, then. Break all traffic laws if necessary. Only be back as soon as possible," cried McKelvie gayly, and I never saw the solemn Jenkins move so fast before.
While we awaited the man's return McKelvie came out of the safe and resumed his indolent pose. Again I found myself growing exasperated with his attitude. Surely there were clues to be found in the room, and he wasn't thinking because those brilliant black eyes were wide-open and wore an expression of contented ease.
"Since you object to my inactivity," he remarked quietly, "let's talk. At least we shall be exercising our tongues, if nothing more," and he laughed oddly.
I ceased trying to understand him and welcomed the opening that he gave me. "Will you answer me three questions?" I inquired.
"Depends on what they are," he returned laconically.
"Nothing really startling," I answered, laughing. "I merely wished to know why if Lee Darwin was outside that study window he did not leave footprints for the police to discover, as they did the ones that he made in the morning."
"Because there is a flower-bed under all the windows except the first two. Beneath those two the cement walk reaches to the wall. He stood on this walk that night, but in the morning having just come in the door he rushed out of the window nearest to him and stepped into the flower-bed."
"I see. Now here's question two. How did you know so unerringly that the lamp was also lighted from the safe?"
"Childishly simple. I had already deduced a secret entrance."
"How?" I broke in.
"Sherlock Holmes says, 'Exclude the impossible, whatever remains improbable must be the truth.' Mrs. Darwin didn't kill her husband or I should not be here. The case is one of murder, not suicide, therefore someone else must have been in the room at midnight. He couldn't leave by the windows or the door and flesh and blood doesn't vanish into air, ergo he must have gone out by some other entrance, natural inference a secret one, since it wasn't discovered."
I nodded. So far it was absurdly simple and clear. I was a trifle mortified that I had not divined it myself, but then such things were not in my line and the affair stuck too close to home to leave me any capacity for ratiocination.
"The question that had to be settled then," he continued, "was the situation of this entrance. I called your attention to the peculiar architecture of the house. When I entered the study I noticed that the safe occupied the wall in question. Jenkins opened it for me and I saw that it was the size of an ordinary closet and not very deep. What was more reasonable than to deduce that the remaining space between the back of the safe and the outer wall of the house was occupied by a passage of some kind!"
Again I nodded. "Of course. It was just a question of accounting for the extra square footage of house. But you haven't answered my original query."
"About the light? Mrs. Darwin said she didn't touch it, the dead man presumably couldn't, therefore the murderer must have done so. If he had pulled the cord Mrs. Darwin would have seen him, hence he lighted the lamp from some other source. Where? Not at the main switch near the door, for he had to vanish at once, knowing the shot would rouse the household. Besides, Mrs. Darwin would have heard the click when he pushed the button. The only place left was somewhere near the entrance. It was more likely to be inside than out, since, as before, Mrs. Darwin heard no sound. So I looked for it in the most plausible spot and found it."
I smiled. "You have answered my third question, which related to the secret entrance, but I have thought of two more to take its place. If the murderer used Darwin's pistol, how is it that only Ruth's finger-prints are on it?"
"He'd be too clever not to use gloves," returned McKelvie shortly.
"To be sure. But here's a harder one. How did the criminal, if he was behind Ruth, shoot Philip Darwin with such accuracy in the dark?"
"Exactly, that's just the point," he replied enigmatically.
When Jenkins arrived with the keys, McKelvie looked them over critically, selected a couple, and tried them on the door. The first was too large, but the second turned the trick. Cautioning us to stoop to avoid the shelves, McKelvie pushed open the back of the safe, which swung away from him into the darkness beyond. With the flash to guide him he stepped through the opening, then beckoned us to follow him. Though it was too dark to see, I knew I was in a room of some sort, for I felt the velvet softness of a carpet beneath my feet, and I also tripped over some article of furniture. By this time McKelvie had located the light and I saw that my room was really an alcove fitted up with a luxurious divan heaped high with pillows, beside which stood a small smoking-stand. But ornate and sumptuous as the alcove was I should not personally have cared for it, since the atmosphere was close and smoke-laden and there was no means of letting in the light of day.
McKelvie glanced hastily about and then striding to the divan he bent down and sniffed at it critically. Instantly I imitated him. To my amazement the same fragrance clung to the Persian cover of the couch that I had detected on the blood-stained handkerchief. I smelled it again to make sure and then as my memory still played me false I turned to ask McKelvie what it was. He was trying his key in the lock of a door at the rear of the room, and if he heard my question he failed to reply to it.
With less difficulty this time he unlocked this second door, which swung inwards and stood at the head of a flight of rather steep and dark stairs. As before, McKelvie preceded Jenkins and myself, but we kept as close as possible to him that his flash might guide us as well. At the bottom of the steps was another door of similar make, which also opened inwards, and to my astonishment it gave exit onto the garden at the side of the house between the first study window and the corner. So skillfully had it been cut in the masonry, however, that only one initiated into the secret of the entrance would have known it was there.
McKelvie examined the ground around the door and as at this point also the cement walk reached clear to the wall, I wondered what he hoped to discover. Whatever it was, his scrutiny satisfied him, for he stood up with a smile and applied his lens to the key-hole of the door. Then he nodded his head in a contented manner and remarked that we had better return to the study. I noticed that he locked all the doors scrupulously behind him, leaving the secret entrance exactly as he had found it, even to replacing the round disk which counterfeited the knot-hole.
Once in the room he knelt down and examined minutely the dial of the safe.
"Interesting and unique," he commented. "Look here, Mr. Davies!" He pointed to the inside of the door, and I noticed to my astonishment that the dial was duplicated within. "Do you get the significance?" he asked quickly.
"Why, that safe can be opened or closed by combination from the inside as well as the outside," I hazarded.
"Naturally, to be of any use as an entrance it would have to be capable of being opened from the inside," he said caustically. "No, what I meant was this. Supposing we want to lock the safe. Give me a combination."
"I gave him 'Darwin,' the first word that occurred to me, for it was one of those old style safes with the six-letter combination. He twirled the knob of the dial on the outside and pointed as he did so to the inside. Just as the inside handle of a door will revolve when the outer one is turned, so the inner knob of the dial duplicated the revolutions of the outer.
"Now, don't you see that in order to use this entrance it is necessary to know what combination was used to lock the safe from the study and vice versa?" he questioned.
"Yes, that's plain enough. To use the entrance the criminal had to know the combination. Well, what of it? A clever man would hardly be balked by so small a thing."
"You still don't get what I'm driving at," he returned. "I'll try to explain. You have arrived at the conclusion that I held a while ago; namely, that the criminal came in and went out by the secret entrance. Am I right?"
"Yes, that is my opinion."
"Now we come to my point," he said, rising and beginning to pace the room. "If the criminal entered by the safe, he must have been cognizant of three things: first, that there was such an entrance; secondly, that three of the doors were opened by a key of a certain size and make; thirdly, that the safe door was unlocked by a certain combination, that combination being the one which Philip Darwin himself had used. That the criminal should know of one, or perhaps of two of these facts, yes. But that he should be aware of all three of them seems incredible!"
"Why incredible?" I objected. "He may have known of the entrance. He could easily then take an impression of the outer lock and have a key made, and Philip Darwin himself may have revealed the combination to him."
"Very good, but not carried quite far enough," he said with his quizzical smile. "Before I show you where you are at fault, answer me a question. How do you suppose that entrance came to be there so very handy for the criminal's purpose?"
"I presume it was built with the house," I answered.
"Precisely. When?"
"Almost a hundred years ago—1830, to be exact."
"Exactly, and old Elias Darwin, the great-grandfather of Philip, who was a firm believer in the established order of affairs, modeled his home in the country (for this stretch of land was country then) on that which was built by his ancestors in pre-revolutionary days, secret entrance and all; for, of course, in those times secret entrances were indispensable for the concealment of friends, whether Tories or Whigs."
"Where did you learn all this?" I asked in amazement.
"I have a book home which details the histories of various mansions in New York," he replied.
"That accounts for the entrance. But what about the safe?" I continued.
"The safe is decidedly more recent. Doubtless the secret entrance had been blocked up, if it was ever cut through, and no one knew of its existence until Philip Darwin stumbled on the knowledge. I looked up the family history of the Darwins this morning while I was awaiting your arrival. Who's Who describes Mr. Frank Darwin, the father, as having been a strait-laced, Puritanical man, and you yourself know what the son was. Can't you imagine the clash between them?"
In view of Mr. Trenton's story concerning Dick's mother I could well believe that father and son had not agreed.
"In 1906 there is record that Frank Darwin went to Europe for a year. Of course, this is mere conjecture, but it is reasonable to suppose that Philip, who was then twenty-one, took the occasion to have the safe built, and the secret entrance unblocked."
"Mason should know," I said.
"I don't think so, or he would have mentioned it at the inquest. However, there is no harm in questioning him. Go and get him, Jenkins."
When Mason stood before us McKelvie said quietly, though his eyes sparkled: "You testified that you had been with the Darwin family thirty years. Did you remain in the house when Mr. Frank Darwin went to Europe in 1906?"
"Yes, sir. I remained as caretaker."
"Then you can tell us when that safe was built?"
"Yes, sir. It was that same year, sir. Mr. Phil complained he had no private safe and his father told him to have one built while he was gone. He chose that place, sir, because he liked the study. His father used the den upstairs."
"Why did he build such a large safe?"
"I don't know, sir. He sent me away to visit some of my folks, sir, while it was being built. He told his father it was to hold his fortune, sir."
McKelvie looked across at me with a triumphant expression which said as plainly as words, "Notice how accurately I deduced the truth," but his voice was subdued enough as he continued his questions.
"He did not get along with his father, I understand?"
"No, sir. They had different ideas on every subject, sir."
"Why didn't Philip Darwin live at his club then, when he came of age?" McKelvie inquired.
"Because his father told him, sir, that if he left the house it would be for good, and not one penny of his money would he get, sir. Mr. Phil knew that his father always carried out his threats, sir."
"That is all, Mason."
"Yes, sir."
The moment the door closed behind the old butler McKelvie said, with a smile, "Just as I thought. And what came in handy when his father was alive was doubly useful after his marriage. And thus we come back to the original discussion, whether the criminal would know the three necessary facts to enter by the safe."
"A member of the family might," I said.
"Yes, a member of the family. Lee, for instance, or even Orton might discover that there was such a passage and secure a key to it. Would either of them know the combination?"
"Orton was Darwin's private secretary."
"As far as his business down-town went, but not his secretary, as far as his personal affairs were concerned. Besides, recall Mason's testimony. He was surprised to find Orton in the study because Darwin always kept it religiously locked, to preserve his secret, of course. Then, too, Orton was Darwin's creature and, therefore, he would be doubly careful not to place himself in the fellow's power. He evidently considered he was running no risk, since he let Orton into the study that night. Besides, if you did not want anyone prying into your safe, what precaution would you take to prevent it?"
"I'd change the combination frequently."
"Exactly; and there you have an answer to my problem. Granted that the criminal knew the first two facts, was he going to depend on a combination that might be changed five minutes before he wished to use the entrance? No, no, we're dealing with a person too clever not to foresee that contingency. Besides, as far as I could detect, no one has recently taken an impression of the outer lock."
"Then we get back where we started and the entrance is of no value to us at all," I pointed out.
"You jump back too far. It merely shows that the criminal did not enter by the safe. That he left that way is proved by the fact that he vanished from the study without using door or windows, and that he very evidently took Darwin's key with him."
"But—the combination?"
"The safe was open, for Darwin had just removed the will from it. Even if it had been closed, a clever man could find an excuse for making his victim open the safe. Once inside any combination of six letters would close the door effectually against intruders."
"I suppose you are right, but how did he get in then?"
"Darwin let him in himself, either through the window or the door. Most probably through the window, since you would have otherwise heard steps in the hall. Recall Orton's testimony. He went to the garage to follow the maid. When he returned he heard voices in the study."
"And when he went in at eleven-thirty, Philip Darwin was alone," I remarked with a smile.
"Yes, to be sure, Philip Darwin was alone," he repeated, crestfallen.
Before I could retort the front door-bell rang sharply. Turning quickly McKelvie walked to the safe and silently locked it. Then he spoke to Jenkins with his usual assured manner. "Tell Mason to answer the bell. And I sha'n't need you again to-day."
"Very well, sir."
As Jenkins opened the door and went out McKelvie dropped into a chair beside me.
"I wonder who that can be," he murmured, "but whoever it may be, not one sign, not one word of what we have learned."
I nodded comprehendingly, and in the pause that ensued I heard Mason shuffle to the door and fumble with the lock. Then a man's voice inquired for me. I heard an answering murmur and rose, turning toward the open study door just as Mr. Cunningham crossed the threshold.
"Mr. Davies," he said, with a smile, extending his hand. He had recovered his voice since the inquest and spoke in a rich baritone.
I gave him my hand, but not over-cordially as I said, suspiciously, "How did you know I was here?"
He laughed, not at all put out. "I called at your apartments to give you some information, and Mr. Trenton kindly told me where I could find you. He also explained your mission. A very laudable purpose. Mr. McKelvie, I presume?" turning toward my companion.
"I beg your pardon," I said stiffly, for I was ashamed of my unjust suspicion, which had its inception in the fact that he was the dead man's lawyer, and as such prejudiced against Ruth, and introduced the two men.
McKelvie, who had also risen at the lawyer's entrance, and who was standing with his hands behind his back, affected not to see Cunningham's extended hand and merely nodded. Annoyed at his incivility, and seeing that Cunningham frowned angrily, I hastened to make the peace.
"Mr. McKelvie put me out of his house when I first called on him," I remarked to Cunningham with a laugh. "You may consider yourself highly honored to have received a bow."
The frown melted from Cunningham's brow as he said, pleasantly enough, "I understand. The idiosyncrasies of the great must be indulgently overlooked," and he returned McKelvie's nod with a ceremonious bow.
"You have some information to impart?" broke in McKelvie briskly as we seated ourselves.
"Yes. I have discovered something that I thought might help toward freeing Mrs. Darwin. You remember," turning to me, "that I testified that Philip Darwin had removed his securities from my office. I learned yesterday that he had used them as I thought upon the market. There was a slump in the stock he was operating the afternoon of the seventh of this month and as far as I can make out he was completely ruined."
"Ruined!" I repeated, for I could recall no rumor to that effect on the Street that day. "You are sure?"
"Positive. He was completely, absolutely ruined," returned the lawyer. He looked at me thoughtfully a moment and then added, "You were wondering why, being a broker yourself, you had not heard of it? The explanation is simple. The world has believed Philip Darwin immensely wealthy for so many years that the truth concerning his financial affairs would have been a decided shock to his friends and associates. Naturally, though he lost heavily on the market on the seventh, no one suspected that he was wiped out, and so nothing was thought of the occurrence, for he had lost as heavily before without its making any appreciable difference to him."
"I understand. And, of course he knew that he was ruined?" I continued.
"He must have known it."
"Then why was he troubling himself to make a new will?" I said, perplexed.
Cunningham shook his head. "I never pretended to understand him. But I thought my information might help along this line. If he had no money Mrs. Darwin certainly didn't murder him to inherit his fortune."
"She may not have known that he was beggared," I retorted.
"Humph! If she swore she did know that fact, who could contradict her?" and he smiled blandly.
"Are you a criminal lawyer, Mr. Cunningham?" queried McKelvie suddenly. He had arisen again when Cunningham began to talk and had been pacing the room in apparent indifference to our conversation.
"No, I am not," answered the lawyer promptly, just a little surprised.
"What an infinite pity! You would make a great success in that line I am sure," responded McKelvie, and in his flexible voice I again detected traces of irony.
Cunningham looked at McKelvie undecided whether to take the remark as an insult or a compliment, and I saw McKelvie's lip curl just a trifle before he continued suavely, "I meant it, Mr. Cunningham. You would make a great criminal lawyer. I advise you to try your hand at that branch of the profession."
Cunningham laughed. "Thanks, but I'm too old a dog to learn new tricks. Besides, I am planning to take a little vacation presently. I expect to travel for the next few years, but I do not mean to intrude my own uninteresting affairs upon you. You have no time to waste in this case. Have you discovered anything of value so far?" he continued with friendly interest.
McKelvie shook his head and sighed. "I am afraid so far it is a losing game," he said with an air of great candor. "The trouble is, as I explained to Mr. Davies, that the scent is cold. The clues are in the hands of the police. Ah, if only I could have been here from the first!"
"It is a pity. They say you are a great detective. I should hate to see you defeated," answered the lawyer, giving McKelvie a Roland for his Oliver.
McKelvie laughed—a short, hard laugh.
"Don't fool yourself, Mr. Cunningham. I am not going to be defeated," he said tersely. "No, not even if the criminal is the cleverest fellow living."
"Pride goeth before destruction, Mr. McKelvie. By this time the criminal has doubtless betaken himself to other parts," returned the lawyer, sardonically.
"The world is small, and I am going to get him if it takes me the rest of my life." McKelvie's jaw snapped with grim determination.
The lawyer rose. "I must be going. Good-by, Mr. Davies. Farewell, Mr. McKelvie. Long life to you, sir."
"Damn his impudence," said McKelvie as the front door slammed, "but he's right. I have no time to waste. I'll call you up in the morning if I have news, and in the meantime say nothing to anyone of our discoveries."
"Not even Mr. Trenton?"
"Not even Mr. Trenton. I'm trusting no one but you and—Jenkins. Also, I do not want that meddlesome old lawyer hanging around when I want to work. Good-by."
"Just a moment. How does what Cunningham told us affect the case as it now stands?"
"Not a hair's breadth. I told you before there was more than enough evidence against her. And I'm hanged if I don't believe he knew it, too!"
Naturally, Mr. Trenton was eager to know what we had accomplished and bombarded me with questions the moment I stepped foot in my apartments, which was not until late, for I had stopped at the office to attend to some pressing business first. I put him off, however, by saying that McKelvie was just getting his bearings and we'd have definite news when I heard from him again. I expected that he would call me up next day, but I received no word from him, so that I had plenty of time to speculate on the little I knew.
Personally, I was not sorry that Philip Darwin had failed, because I did not relish the idea of Ruth's inheriting his money, but I could not understand why McKelvie had disparaged Cunningham's motive in giving us this information. Not that I wanted to side with the man. I felt the same unreasonable antagonism that McKelvie evidently experienced toward him, but I wanted to be fair, and as far as I could see he was desirous of helping us as much as he could.
At any rate, motives for the crime, as far as Ruth was concerned, were valueless, since we knew of the existence of the secret entrance. What troubled me most was this point. Why should any sane man (I presume that the criminal was sane, if criminality is not another form of insanity) I repeat, why should any sane man shoot another one in the dark in the presence of a third person with the chances ten to one against his hitting the one at whom he aimed, and ten to one in favor of his being discovered? It was absurd on the face of it, yet it was just what had happened in the study that night, and twist it as I would I could make neither rhyme nor reason out of it. McKelvie had said the criminal was a clever man and clever criminals don't usually leave anything to chance, for only chance could have directed his aim in a room so dark that he could not possibly see his prospective victim!
Though I thought about it continually, this point was still a puzzle when McKelvie phoned me, early the second day after our visit to Riverside Drive, and asked me to meet him there at ten o'clock, but to tell no one where I was going. As I was in the habit of leaving for the office about eight I said nothing of my ultimate destination to Mr. Trenton, but I ordered Jenkins to be at the office as near nine-thirty as possible. I did not know whether McKelvie wanted him or not, and it was simpler to dismiss him than to send for him.
When we entered Darwin's study at ten o'clock sharp McKelvie was standing at one of the windows whistling. He greeted us with a smile and the remark, "Well, I'm all ready to tell you how the murder was committed."
"You have discovered something new?" I asked quickly.
"One or two things, but nothing bearing on my statement. I knew before I entered this room day before yesterday how it was done. For another that might seem impossible, but for me, no. It was simplicity itself."
I couldn't help smiling at this piece of conceit and catching my look he laughed good-humoredly.
"All great detectives—and I am one, according to my friend, Cunningham—are egotistical," he said.
"Is that the reason that Sherlock Holmes is an egotist, sir?" asked Jenkins suddenly.
"Undoubtedly; and why not, since he is the greatest of his kind. You see great detectives seldom fail, and so naturally they become—well—self-opinionated," returned McKelvie.
But I had not come there to discuss the failings of detectives, great or small, so I proceeded to dismount him from his hobby.
"You said you knew how the murder was done. So does anyone who reads the papers. The coroner's inquest made that fact plain," I said to get him started. I had learned already that he disliked having his statements belittled.
"The coroner's inquest!" he scoffed. "Haven't you the wit to see that the inquest was in the hands of the police from the start? Jones questioned Orton in the morning and then calmly used Graves and his jury as a vehicle for tightening the net in which Mrs. Darwin had become entangled. What chance then had the truth for even so much as lifting its head? I suppose the police explained to your satisfaction how the murderer shot so accurately in the dark?" he ended, cynically.
I smiled inwardly as I realized that I had drawn the very fire I wanted. Now I would have the answer to my puzzle.
"Well, how did he do it?" I asked, unruffled.
"He didn't. He shot Darwin while the lamp was lighted, like any right-minded person," he answered triumphantly. "By the way, Jenkins, I don't believe I'll need you to-day."
"Very well, sir."
I waited until Jenkins had gone and then I replied to McKelvie's statement. "What you have just remarked is utterly impossible," I retorted. "Ruth heard the shot before she saw the lamp spring into being, and she was speaking the truth."
He laughed. "Certainly, I am not disputing that point. I am merely making the assertion that the murderer shot his victim while the lamp, and for all I know, all the lights were lighted."
"But——"
"On second thoughts I don't believe I'll tell you. You might be as skeptical of my information as you were triumphant just now at having roused my ire," he answered laconically, and I knew that I had not deceived him long with my pretense of blockheadedness.
"I promise to believe anything you may say and swallow it all, hook, line and sinker," I pleaded.
"Well, perhaps under those circumstances—" he appeared to reflect, then said abruptly, "Would you call Dr. Haskins a man who knew his business?"
"Yes, decidedly so," I replied, surprised at the turn in the conversation.
"He remarked, if you remember, that Philip Darwin lived twenty minutes after the bullet had penetrated his lung, and yet he also agreed with the coroner's physician that Philip Darwin died at midnight or shortly thereafter. You yourself can testify that the shot was fired at midnight. How then do you account for the discrepancies in these various facts, for facts they are?"
My mind reverted to the inquest, and I heard again the pompous coroner's physician explaining Dr. Haskins' mistake, and I also recalled the young doctor's face, which certainly belied his apparent acquiescence with the other's statement. And suddenly I saw what McKelvie was driving at. Yet, how could it possibly be?
"You mean that he had already been shot when Ruth entered this room?" I said slowly, hardly daring to believe that which I uttered. It was so incredible, so seemingly impossible!
"Yes, just that." The words came with quiet conviction.
"But I heard no other shot, and Philip Darwin was alive at eleven-thirty!"
"Of course you heard no shot. We're dealing with a clever man, I tell you, and he wasn't advertising his actions," returned McKelvie, with that note of impatience in his voice which crept into it whenever I failed immediately to grasp the point. "I'll show you how it was done, so that no one could possibly have heard that shot, even if there had been someone listening at door or windows, which, of course, there was not."
He walked to the safe, and unlocked the door. Then he inserted his key in the back wall and ushered me into the secret room.
"In here," he said, "no noise, however great, could be heard without these walls. They are sound-proof, for I have tested them myself. I fired a pistol by means of a mechanism, and then listened in the hall for its explosion. I heard nothing. When I returned to this room the pistol had gone off, as was intended. So you can see that shooting his victim in here with the doors closed there was no chance that the shot would be heard by anyone in the house at the time."
I stared at him in astonishment. "But, McKelvie, Jones proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that Philip Darwin had just risen in his chair at the table when he was shot," I protested.
"Jones proved it!" he jeered. "Ye gods! Jones proved it! Of course he proved it. What else would you expect of Jones? Why do you suppose the murderer took the trouble to make those marks in the carpet except to fool the police?" he raged. "Certainly Jones proved it when it was put there for that purpose!"
"Granted," I said pacifically. "He shot Darwin in this secret room. Then what?"
McKelvie calmed down and resumed his story. "Then he proceeded to manufacture evidence. He carried his victim through the safe," returning to the study as he spoke and relocking the entrance, "placed him in that chair and arranged everything to look as though Philip Darwin had been writing, as indeed he had been when Orton came in at eleven-thirty. Then, satisfied that all was as perfect as he could make it, he turned off the light and waited."
"What for?"
"Mrs. Darwin, naturally."
"How on earth did he know she would come into the room? How could he possibly divine that I would urge her to get me that letter when I only spoke on impulse myself?"
McKelvie sighed. "I'm not omniscient. If I could tell you how he knew it, or why, I could tell you who committed the crime. I am only reconstructing what actually happened, for he was in the room at midnight, wasn't he, since he fired that second shot and lighted the lamp? And is it reasonable to suppose that it took him twenty minutes to shoot his victim and place him in that chair?"
I acquiesced, but not because I could see through the affair. It was growing more intricate with every step we took. "But why, man, why?" I persisted.
"Because he needed a scapegoat. It may be, of course, and probably is, the fact that he was about to leave when he heard Mrs. Darwin try the door, and that the idea then came to him to incriminate her."
"Why—that's monstrous!" I cried.
McKelvie shrugged. "When you are dealing with a murderer, his little ideas are apt to be rather outside the pale of civilized folk," he returned ironically. "By providing the police with a suspect he escaped their vigilance. Mrs. Darwin had the most motive for killing her husband; therefore, she made the best possible victim. But he figured without me. It's like a game of chess. He makes a move. I block him. At present it's 'check,' with all the advantage on his side and every prospect of the jury finding Mrs. Darwin guilty of the murder."
He had forgotten my presence and was talking to himself, his eyes grown dreamy as he gazed into the distance. At my exclamation, he passed a hand across his eyes, saying in a different tone, "I beg your pardon. I forgot in my interest in matching my wits against his, that to you Mrs. Darwin is more than a pawn in the game."
"McKelvie, surely you can't be serious," I implored him.
"I'm sorry to say that I am," he returned. "The prosecution has a very strong case, and we have nothing we can offer that refutes a single point that they can make." He moved away from the window, where he had been sitting for some little time, and began to pace the room in long, even strides.
"If only I knew where that second bullet had lodged itself! The physician declares there was only one wound and only one bullet; therefore, it's not in Darwin's body. Also, I have searched every square inch of this room—walls, ceiling, floor, carpet and furniture. There's not a trace, nor even the faintest shadow of a trace of that bullet!"
He shook his head despairingly, but I had hardly listened to his harangue. My mind had leaped to a sudden joyful conclusion.
"McKelvie," I cried, "we have evidence to refute their arguments! Let's go before the district attorney and tell him what we have learned and insist on his releasing Ruth at once!"
"What evidence do you refer to?" he inquired a bit coldly. "Do you take me for a mere calculating machine without any human feelings and consideration for others? Don't you suppose that if I had any valuable evidence I should have used it to advantage long ere this?"
"Why," I stammered, all the wind taken out of my sails, "what about the—the secret entrance?"
"As to that, it may or may not have been used upon that fatal night. We conjecture because we are proving Mrs. Darwin innocent, but we do not positively know anything about it," he put in imperturbably. "Mr. Darwin may have lost or misplaced his key."
"How do you account then for the lighting of the lamp from the safe?" I persisted.
"Again, we do not know it was so lighted. Often, if a connection is loose, a jar or shock will light the lamp of itself."
"But the shot in the dark?"
"Ah, the police don't believe for a second that the room was ever in darkness at any time. They believe that you and Mrs. Darwin concocted that bit of evidence."
"When?" I spluttered.
"You gave the wrong impression about Mrs. Darwin the night of the crime. They would argue collusion before their arrival."
"But, McKelvie, what about the actual time when Philip Darwin was killed, twenty minutes before Ruth ever set foot in the study?" I continued, exasperated by his skillful refutation of my arguments.
"On what do I base that conclusion?" he asked quietly.
"On Dr. Haskins' testimony."
"Exactly. And do you believe for a moment that the district attorney will give credence to a fact which Coroner Graves practically ruled out of his court?" he demanded.
But I was still determined to have my way, for I wanted to free Ruth above everything else. "There's the second shot to prove it," I said stubbornly.
He looked at me a moment with a strange smile, then he tapped his head significantly. "Pardon me," he said quizzically, as I flushed angrily, "I had forgotten you are in love and that lovers are never logical. Don't be angry with me and I'll show you what would happen if I approached Grenville with your last statement as a proof of my previous deductions. You have no experience in such matters, but, unfortunately, I know Grenville so very well."
McKelvie drew his mouth down in imitation of the district attorney, whose picture I had seen more than once in the paper, and then continued his exposition, mimicking Grenville's soft voice, as I suppose, whenever the part demanded it.
"When I had been ushered into his office he would adjust his glasses and listen with an air of great politeness to all I had to say. Then, when I was through he would smile, still politely, very, if a trifle sarcastically, and remark in his purring voice (the purr of the tiger before he shows his claws):
"'Of course, since only one shot was fired from Mr. Darwin's pistol, you have brought with you the weapon that produced the second shot?'
"I would have to acknowledge that I not only had no such weapon, but not even the prospect of finding it.
"'No? Then, of course,' with a still deeper purr, 'you have brought me the bullet itself?'
"'Well, no,' I would answer sheepishly, 'I haven't even got that.'
"'What! No bullet either? Dear, dear, Mr. McKelvie, you really are a genius in your line. And you would actually have me credit the evidence of a chimera, a hypothetical revolver that fires a shot that leaves no trace——'"
Here McKelvie broke off abruptly and banged his fist against his forehead. "Stupid, stupid. Oh, that someone would write me down an ass!"
"What's the trouble, now?" I asked. "I thought you were doing very well."
"As regards Grenville? Well, I'm glad you realize that we couldn't prove anything with mere deduction unsubstantiated by facts, for any clever prosecutor could knock our evidence into a cocked hat. No, I was referring to something else," he returned, gazing somberly before him with a look akin to horror in his eyes.
"What is it?" I demanded.
He shook off whatever was troubling him and replied in a self-contemptuous tone, "Nothing, except that I must be getting old. I have actually allowed myself to ape that pompous idiot of a coroner's physician, and have thus been guilty of the worst crime in the decalogue of a detective. I have been fitting the facts to my theory instead of fitting my theory to the facts!"
"And that proves?"
"Just what I told you before, that we are face to face with a far cleverer, more cold-blooded man than even I had given him credit for being!"
I was taken by surprise when Mason knocked on the door to tell us that he had prepared some luncheon for us. We had talked for two hours and had virtually arrived—nowhere! The thing was beginning to get on my nerves and I said as much to McKelvie as we seated ourselves at the table.
"Yes," he returned. "It's getting on mine, too. I feel like—well, a person tied to a tree, who can go so far and no farther. But I'm going to break away."
"You mean you are going to try to locate the criminal since we can find no clues to help Ruth?" I asked.
"No, not directly, at present. I'm going to try to locate substantial evidence against him, for your clever criminal is not so easily caught. The trouble lies right here. Though I know the murderer is clever I have no idea as to his identity, because I do not absolutely know the true motive for the crime. Or, rather, I should say, no proof, for unfortunately there are any number of persons who might have been in the house at that time and who had sufficient motive for killing Darwin."
"Can't some of them produce alibis?"
"Alibis! I spent all day yesterday chasing alibis. Let's go over them. First, there's Mr. Trenton——"
"Heavens! You don't suspect him?" I gasped.
"Why not? Don't you suppose he realized as you did that he was primarily to blame for Mrs. Darwin's marriage? And didn't he, while living in this house, have an opportunity to witness and resent the treatment accorded to his daughter? And more than resent his own humiliation at the hands of Philip Darwin, a humiliation of which even young Darwin was cognizant, if he spoke the truth at the inquest?"
"You're right. I hadn't connected him with the affair at all. I suppose because he was away," I replied.
He smiled. "I think we can safely knock him off our list, for though he had motive he had not the opportunity. I motored to Tarrytown yesterday and had an interview with Mrs. Bailey. On the night of the seventh, Mr. Trenton was ill, too ill to leave his bed, and precisely at midnight she, herself, and her doctor were in attendance upon him."
"I'm glad of that," I said, drawing a long breath. "It's bad enough as it is without dragging Mr. Trenton into it, too."
"Though I made certain of his alibi because I am leaving no stones unturned in this case, still I never for one moment believed him guilty. It would be a monstrous father, indeed, who would let his daughter remain in jail if a word from him could clear her, particularly if he loved her and had bitterly repented of his former treatment of her."
"That's one off the list. Who else could have done it?" I prompted, as he remained absorbed in thought.
"Cunningham is clever, and though he may have had opportunity, he lacks motive. I saw the telephone girl in the apartment house where he has a suite of rooms. She says that he left town about the first of October and did not return until about ten o'clock the morning of the eighth. Of course he might have got in the night before, in which case he spent the night in the street or with a friend, for he is not registered at any of the hotels, although he could have registered under an assumed name, both of which presumptions are absurd, since he could have easily returned home and none the wiser. The girl said he looked as he usually did when he returned from out of town, but she had no idea where he went. It seems he has many out-of-town clients whom he visits occasionally, and it would certainly take quite a while to locate them and get the desired information, with the chances ten to one that he went somewhere else altogether, and had nothing to do with the murder after all. The only thing I have against him is that he is clever, and for that matter so I should judge was Richard Trenton."
"You think Dick might have done it?"
"I'm overlooking no one. I saw Jones and got from him all the data concerning Trenton's actions on that night. Also I telegraphed to the Chicago police to try to locate anyone who may have known him there and we should be hearing from that end in a day or two. There is one fact that stands out clearly, and can't be explained away. He left the hotel before eleven and did not return until one. Also there is no trace of where he went during that time since, though he taxied to the hotel, he was clever enough to take the Subway or the surface car to his destination. Then we have the letter he wrote his father, which certainly points to his intention to see Philip Darwin. Whether he did or not, we don't know, but it's quite probable that he did come here, and that the two men had a conference of some sort. Again I'm inclined to believe that he is innocent for the same reason that exonerated the father in my eyes. Yet there is his suicide to account for, and the still stranger fact that he left no word of any kind to explain his act."
He paused, then continued with a shake of the head, "There's not much use bothering with him at present, for he's beyond helping us in our predicament. There are others who may prove more useful."
"What about Lee?" I inquired, remembering the stick-pin and where it had been found.
"Lee Darwin is the most likely suspect that I have," he returned, then quietly busied himself with his dessert, for Mason had entered and was hovering around. "By the way," he added, as we left the dining-room, "I have an appointment with the steward of the Yale Club on this very matter. I went there yesterday but Carpe was away and I left word that I would call at one-thirty to see him. Supposing you drive me over."
"After this visit I'll be able to decide whether our young friend had the chance to commit murder," he continued when we were in the car headed for the Yale Club. "He had plenty of motive."
"Chance, too, McKelvie. Didn't you say yourself that he was there that night when you first showed me his stick-pin?"
"I said he was there and I still say it, but that means nothing at all. We have got to prove that he was there at the psychological moment."
I nodded. "But, even if he had been, I can't see where you find a motive. He quarreled with his uncle, I know, but there was nothing in that to cause him to shoot Darwin."
"Wasn't there?" answered McKelvie. "Surely you don't believe that he really quarreled with his uncle about Mrs. Darwin? It's absurd on the face of it, that he should suddenly object to treatment that he had accepted with utter indifference for five months or so. No, no, I have another theory altogether about that quarrel."
Our arrival at the Club put an end to our discussion. Carpe, the steward, whom I had interviewed the night I first sought McKelvie, came forward as we entered. He was a big, dependable fellow, this steward, and had been in the employ of the Club for years. Moreover, he could be trusted to give correct information about the doings of the various members of the Club, all of whom he knew well.
"Good afternoon," he said pleasantly. "If you will come into the office I shall be glad to accommodate you."
We followed him into a small room at the side of the hall and he invited us to be seated, as he dropped heavily into a chair at his desk, but McKelvie remained standing, and as he put his questions he paced back and forth with his hands clasped behind his back.
"I desire to ask you some questions about Mr. Lee Darwin, Mr. Carpe," he began. "You have heard nothing from him since he left?"
"No, sir, not a word," replied Carpe, slowly.
"Go back to October seventh, Mr. Carpe. Lee Darwin engaged rooms for that night, did he not?" continued McKelvie.
"Yes. He called me personally about noon and said he wanted a suite of rooms for an indefinite time. He came in some time during the afternoon but went out again at five o'clock."
"You are sure of the time?"
"Yes. There was to be a banquet of some kind to which he had been invited. It was just striking five as he came into my office here and told me he could not attend, asking me to make his excuses for him. He said he would not be back until late. It made an impression on me at the time because he was not in evening clothes and I had always known Mr. Lee Darwin for a very fastidious young man."
"Do you know what time he got back?" McKelvie inquired after a pause.
"He didn't come back that night," answered Carpe.
McKelvie and I exchanged glances. "You could swear to that?" asked McKelvie eagerly.
"I could. I sleep on the first floor at the back of the house. About five o'clock in the morning I heard someone knocking on my window and I got up to see who wanted me at such an hour. We don't keep open house at this Club. In the dim light I saw that the man was Mr. Lee Darwin, so I motioned him to the back and opened the door for him myself. It was quite a shock to me to see him, I can tell you. He was pale and wild-eyed and his clothes were rumpled and dusty. He stumbled in and I helped him to his room. He told me to keep quiet about him and naturally I promised. I thought he had been out on a spree of some kind. He acted as if he might have been drinking," explained Carpe ponderously.
"What did he do after you promised silence?" McKelvie took a turn around the room as he put the question.
"He went to bed, and at luncheon time I awakened him. He dressed hurriedly and rushed out without eating and did not return until three. There was a telegram waiting for him. He read it and then tore it up and his hands were trembling as he did so. Then he remarked that he was leaving for the South on business and asked me to leave his rooms undisturbed. He left in ten minutes and that is the last I have seen of him," replied Carpe.
"When he came back the morning of the eighth, were you really positive that he had been drinking, or did he give you another impression as well?" continued McKelvie.
"Well, to be candid, at the time he seemed to me to be scared, as if he had seen something that had terrified him plumb out of his wits. It was afterwards in thinking it over that I decided that he had been out on a lark," responded Carpe, after a moment's consideration.
"I should like to examine his rooms," said McKelvie abruptly.
"Certainly." Carpe rose and led the way up the stairs, along a hall and into a suite consisting of a dressing-room, bedroom, and bath.
The rooms were nicely furnished but were not unusual in any way and gave no indication of having been recently used. Everything was in immaculate order.
"Any of his belongings still around?" queried McKelvie.
"Yes, he left some things in the chiffonier."
McKelvie strode to the article of furniture in question and examined its contents with great care, as if hunting for some definite object. Then with a shrug he announced that he was through. I thought he had been disappointed in his search, but one look into his sparkling eyes told me a different tale. He had been successful, but what had he expected to find?
"Thank you, Mr. Carpe. I'm much obliged to you. Keep my visit a secret, particularly as your information may not be of value to me and might, if gossiped about, merely create an unpleasant situation for the young man," said McKelvie as we returned to the lower floor.
"Just as you say. Good afternoon, Mr. McKelvie," and the door closed behind us.
As we descended the steps I said curiously, "What did you find, McKelvie?"
For answer he pulled from his pocket a small yellow satin sachet bag with the initials L. D. embroidered on it in blue. He placed it in my hand and with the remark, "Take a good whiff. It's a heavenly scent."
I held the dainty bag to my nostrils and inhaled deeply. It was wonderfully, delicately fragrant. I had a distinct recollection of having been recently made conscious that there was in this world such a subtle, elusive perfume, but for the moment I could not place it. Like a melody that haunts by its familiarity even when its name eludes the mind, did this perfume waft across my senses the knowledge that I had breathed in its fragrance before and on two distinct occasions. Then memory awoke and I saw myself drawing back from a blood-stained handkerchief which had been suddenly thrust beneath my nose at Headquarters, and recalled wondering where I had come across that perfume before. Ah, I had it. It was Dick who first introduced me to it. He also had a tiny sachet of yellow satin embroidered in blue and when I noticed it with some astonishment among his things he laughed in an embarrassed way and said a girl he knew had made it for him. When I asked him what it was he named it for me with a shame-faced look.
The subtle perfume that now assailed my nostrils and delighted my senses was none other than the fragrance that scented Dick's belongings, that clung to the Persian silk cover in the secret room, and that had left its trace on that square of cambric that Philip Darwin had been holding, the fragrance of Rose Jacqueminot! And Rose Jacqueminot meant a woman and the only woman I could think of was—Cora Manning.
"What do you make of this, McKelvie?" I asked, returning the sachet.
He shrugged. "May be important and may not. I was more interested in hearing that he had been out all night."
"Which means of course that he had the opportunity," I interpreted.
"Yes, he had the opportunity, but he may not have used it. His stick-pin is no proof that he was there at midnight. There are all sorts of possibilities in a case like this one. However, he did have ample motive, for besides the quarrel there is the will. I examined specimens of Philip Darwin's handwriting. He does not make his capitals with a flourish. He makes his R's straight. So he was disinheriting his nephew and not his wife. Also the criminal knew that fact, or why his attempt to destroy the scraps by burning, which would account, you see, for his still being in the study when Mrs. Darwin entered."
"Somehow I can't believe Lee did it—unless it was on impulse," I said, recalling the young man's noble countenance. "Besides, McKelvie, surely he isn't so depraved as to implicate Ruth!"
"'Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?'" he quoted. "He has the Darwin blood in his veins."
"So has Dick for that matter," I thought to myself.
"I don't mean to imply by that that he necessarily committed the murder," continued McKelvie. "I merely state that he had plenty of motive and chance. But so did several others, as we know. And even if he is the murderer we have no proof of that fact; nor does there seem to be at present any chance of questioning him. I have a man on his trail, but so far Wilkins has met with no success. He's evidently disguised, since no one recognizes his photograph, which, added to his use of Rose Jacqueminot sachet, looks very bad indeed."
"Why?" I put in.
"Ask me that again later and I may be able to give you a more definite answer," he retorted. "To return to the subject. It may take months to find Lee and we haven't months to waste on this case."
"What do you propose to do then?" I asked despairingly.
"I'm going to let you drive me over to Forty-second Street to see Claude Orton," he responded, entering my car.