CHAPTER XXTHE RULING PASSION
Betty Carter, too unhappy to keep to her room, where she had found bed intolerable after recovering from her faint, was the first to hear Roberts’ frantic cries for mercy as Trenholm got him upon his feet and half dragged, half lifted his prisoner into a chair. She stood aghast in the doorway of Mrs. Nash’s bedroom until pushed further inside by Alan Mason and Doctor Nash, who had paused to pick up a lighted lamp and carried it with him. Mrs. Nash, leaning heavily on Miriam’s arm, was likewise not slow in reaching her room, while Martha was only restrained from racing upstairs also by a terrified Anna, whose detaining clutch she could not loosen.
“Good God!” Alan dashed to Trenholm’s side as Roberts, his paroxysm over, sank weakly back in his chair and covered his face with his manacled hands. “What is the meaning of this, Guy?”
“Doctor Roberts murdered Paul Abbott,” stated Trenholm, and his announcement created a profound sensation.
Mrs. Nash dropped into the nearest seat, for oncebereft of speech, while Alan, his face transfigured, stumbled over to Betty, and kneeling, pressed her hand to his lips.
“Betty, my darling!” he exclaimed incoherently. “I knew that you were here on Monday night, and then you denied your visit. Corbin told me that you had bribed him into giving up your bloodstained scarf. God forgive me! I was afraid that you had killed Paul.”
“Do not reproach yourself too much,” she said, and her soft, clear voice held its old accustomed thrill. Unmindful of the presence of the others, she drew him to his feet and his arms encircled her. “I did you a greater wrong, Alan, when I married Paul, while my heart was given to you.”
“But you did not marry Paul—you married me,” declared Alan, and but for his supporting arm Betty would have fallen.
“You—she married you!” Mrs. Nash was getting her fill of excitement. With eyes half starting from her head, she gazed at her niece and Alan. “You—Alan”—while her husband feebly echoed her words.
“Yes”—facing their concentrated regard with head thrown back, his face alight with hope and love, Alan’s voice rang out clearly. “Paul sent for me and I spent Monday morning with him. Just before I left came your telegram, Betty, saying thatyou and Nash were on your way here and that you would marry him. It was a frightful shock, and for hours I wandered about the countryside, keeping out of people’s way. I determined to see Paul again and tell him of my passionate love for you, Betty—” he sighed. “I must have been a bit mad—”
Betty pressed his hand. “Go on,” she begged; “don’t stop.”
“I reached here after midnight and knocked on the side door, but could not arouse Corbin,” continued Alan. “Paul and I had often entered the house in the old days when he had forgotten his doorkey, by climbing up to the veranda roof and entering a window of his room. As I reached his window, which was conveniently open, I heard the front door bell ring loudly. I judged it was Betty arriving with Doctor Nash and, pausing to take off my muddy shoes and overcoat, I left them outside on the roof, and then dropped inside the bedroom and rushed over to speak to Paul. The bed was empty.”
“Great heavens!” Miriam stared, astounded, at Alan. “Where was Mr. Abbott?”
“I don’t know,” admitted Alan. “At the time I supposed he was out in the hall, as I could hear voices. When they came closer I climbed into the empty bed, to avoid being seen, and pulled the bedclothesup over me. I couldn’t face Betty and Paul in their, what I supposed to be, hour of happiness. I was horrified when Betty and Nash came directly into the bedroom, and I suddenly realized that they took me for Paul.”
“Were you wearing a false beard?” asked Trenholm.
“No, not a false one. I had let my beard grow for the past two weeks,” explained Alan, “and shaved it off on Tuesday morning. To go back to the scene in the bedroom—the lamp had gone out, and except for the firelight the room was dark, and I prayed that Betty would leave without recognizing me. Before I could collect my senses, Doctor Nash read the marriage service—”
“And you made the responses?”
“Yes; the doctor prompted me.” Alan flushed hotly, then paled. “I think I was mad that night. My voice is like Paul’s.”
“It was your greatest point of resemblance,” commented Trenholm, “and the recollection of it finally gave me the key to the situation.”
Alan turned to Miriam and spoke with honest contrition. “I didn’t know that Paul had a nurse,” he said. “You weren’t here in the morning. I was still lying in Paul’s bed, trying dazedly to plan something—anything—when I heard some one return andwalk swiftly to the bed. I heard your outcry and the sound of your fall, and,” in shame-faced honesty, “I bolted out of the window, gathered up my hat, coat and shoes, and fled.”
“Just a moment,” broke in Trenholm. “How about the ring you gave Miss Carter?”
Alan eyed him in surprise. “Oh, the ring?” he echoed. “Paul gave it to me Monday morning—that was why I happened to have it about me.”
“And why did Paul give you a ring which he valued with almost superstitious fervor?” inquired Trenholm.
“It wasn’t his original ring, but an exact replica which, Paul told me on Monday, he had had made for me. The original ring was a gold coin of the First century of the Christian era and belonged to my grandfather, another Alan Mason—”
“The suicide?”
Alan winced slightly as he bowed. “I don’t know Paul’s motive in having the ring copied for me—he often did freakish, unaccountable things.”
His remarks were checked by an exclamation from Roberts, who had regained some semblance of self-control while listening to Alan.
“There was no accounting for what Paul would do,” he stated, and all eyes turned to him, partly in curiosity, but more in unconcealed horror. “I mayas well make my confession now as later,” he sighed. “After I left Abbott’s Lodge I motored to Upper Marlboro, deciding, as it was such a bad night, that I would remain at the hotel. It was before midnight when Corbin came in and told me that a letter had come that day from Canada from Zybinn and that he had taken it, with other papers, to the room Paul used as a sitting room. I gave Corbin his customary bribe—”
“Cocaine,” interposed Miriam quickly, and Roberts nodded.
“I took Corbin’s key to the front door,” he went on, speaking with more of an effort, “and came back to find the letter which,” turning with a scowl to Trenholm, “with your infernal astuteness, you divined bore a stamp code. You planted that letter and this trap—”
“I did,” admitted Trenholm quietly. “I realized that the thirteenth letter had not been read either by Paul or the person for whom the code was intended. Knowing that attempts had been made to steal something from this room, I judged that the letter had been lost here, and so”—with a quiet smile at Mrs. Nash—“I arranged to have the room vacated for an hour or two. I knew whoever would attempt to steal that letter had killed Paul.”
“But why?” demanded Doctor Nash.
“Because the stamp code tells where Paul had secreted the Paltoff diamond.”
“It does!” Roberts was on his feet; his features distorted. “Good God! to think that I failed by so short a margin.”
“Sit down!” directed Trenholm, with a significant pressure on the physician’s shoulder. “What did you do, Roberts, when you reached Abbott’s Lodge on Monday night?”
“I stole softly up here.” Roberts moistened his parched lips. “I found the letter which Corbin had placed on the table and took up the nut pick, intending to open the envelope, take out the letter and leave it, and study the stamp code at my leisure at the hotel. A noise at my elbow caused me to glance around—Paul was standing at my side.”
“Well—what next?” prompted Trenholm, as Roberts ceased speaking.
“My face must have betrayed me,” he continued, a second later. “Paul’s unexpected appearance shocked me out of my self-control. He turned, I suppose to call for help, and I drove the nut pick into his back.”
There was a pause which none cared to break. Roberts wiped some perspiration from his forehead and then spoke more rapidly.
“I stood gazing down at the dead man, for Ihad turned out the lamp which I had lighted only a second before, and waited in the dark, my brain whirling. Paul had left the door partly open and I not only heard but saw Betty and Nash and Miss Ward enter Paul’s bedroom. Every instant I expected to hear an outcry when they discovered Paul was not in the bed. The suspense was something frightful”—his voice shook, and he steadied it with an effort. “Peering out from behind the door I saw Nash and Betty leave, and Miss Ward return to Paul’s bedroom. There followed a slight cry, a heavy fall, and then silence. I waited for a second or two, then crept across the hall and into the bedroom. Miss Ward was lying in a faint on the floor, and Paul’s bed was empty.”
“So, fearing she would revive too soon, you chloroformed her and carried Paul’s dead body into the room and put it into his bed,” completed Trenholm, as Roberts broke down, unable to go on. “How did you lose the letter?”
“I don’t know—it is the one confused incident of the night,” replied Roberts, after some hesitation. “The letter must have flown out of my hand as I struck at Paul.” Roberts sighed heavily. “It happened that Paul fell on some soiled sheets which Martha had thrown on the floor, intending to take away the next morning. I used the sheets and awoman’s scarf to staunch the flow of blood and gave them, with my driving gloves, which I had not removed, to Corbin to destroy. There was nothing to indicate that Paul had been in this bedroom, nothing to link me with the crime.” Roberts sighed again. “Then an overwhelming terror and an unspeakable horror of what I had done drove me out of the house and I did not come again into this bedroom to make a search for the letter. The next morning Alan and Trenholm and the coroner gave me no time alone, and then came Mrs. Nash and she was put in here—and with her awake in the daytime and Miss Ward on duty at night”—Roberts’ gesture was eloquent as he looked at Trenholm. “Well, you beat me. But I’d like to know where you found the letter and how you discovered the code.”
“Miss Ward did both,” replied Trenholm as they looked at him. “She found the letter in that chair,” pointing to it, “tucked under the upholstery and the seat cushion where it evidently had fallen; and she suspected that a code was concealed in the peculiar use of five one-cent Canadian stamps, in place of the regular three-cent postage, on thirteen letters. We deciphered the code—and this message:—”
“Well?” questioned Roberts eagerly, as he paused. “What?”
“‘Watch thirteenth letter suicides grave,’” repeated Trenholm, and his listeners gazed at him blankly. Turning abruptly to Betty, he addressed her. “Did you take some photographs of this house a little while ago, and one of this room?”
“Why, yes,” she exclaimed. “Just before I went to Canada, and Mr. Zybinn developed the negatives for me. He was a paralytic, and while unable to walk, dabbled in photography. He had some enlargements made of my kodak films.”
“And one of this room?” quickly.
“Yes. He said it was a remarkably good interior and made me describe all the objects in it—”
“Especially this”—going over to the wall, Trenholm took down a picture and held it in plain view. He stopped as the constable and Riley came into the bedroom, the latter with a sheaf of telegrams in his hand. “Ah, Constable, you are just in time—this picture was made by Paul’s mother, who was an artist of some ability. She modeled it after those quaint Swiss paintings of a cemetery with a church in the background, in which arealclock was put in the tower. In this picture of the Masons’ neglected burying ground, Mrs. Abbott etched in the background a church tower andplaced in the tower this antique watch.”
Trenholm turned the picture around and pointedto a watch, a tiny affair, which was firmly held in the canvas by a clever contrivance. He drew out the watch with a careful hand, the others watching him breathlessly.
“The first word of the code is ‘watch.’ Here it is,” Trenholm held up the antique watch. “The next two words, ‘thirteenth letter,’ which is ‘M’, you will find is the initial engraved on the back of the watch; and the last two words, ‘suicide’s grave,’ exemplified by this picture of Colonel Mason’s grave.” Trenholm turned to Betty and asked: “Did you not tell Zybinn that you chanced to see Paul remove the works from this watch?”
“Yes,” she admitted. “Zybinn asked me if the watch was too old to keep accurate time and I told him Paul had taken it apart.”
“So that was it,” and Trenholm nodded. “Paul removed the works from the watch because he evidently judged it to be an admirable hiding place for—”
“The Paltoff diamond!” shouted Roberts.
For answer Trenholm opened the watch. Inside the round hollow lay a wad of cotton—and on top of it the lost jewel.
They gathered about the table, even Roberts, forgetful for a brief second that he was handcuffed,and gazed at the beautiful gem, dazzled by its luster and purity.
Trenholm was the first to speak. “Paul knew little rest after the Paltoff diamond was intrusted to his care. He was constantly haunted by a morbid fear of losing it or of being robbed of it, so that he could never be induced to exhibit it.”
“He showed it to Betty and to me,” declared Mrs. Nash, breaking her long silence. “And swore us to absolute secrecy. I greatly feared,” she added, “that Betty was in some way mixed up in the tragedy and my husband’s extraordinary denial of their presence here on Monday, when Pierre had brought me Betty’s telegram to Paul, fed my imagination—and—and—I dropped that note to you, Mr. Trenholm, and—” not meeting her husband’s reproachful glance, but looking instead at Miriam—“I took surreptitious doses of phenacetin and accidentally overdid it and nearly killed myself, but,” with a return of her old arrogant air, “I was determined to find out what was going on in this house, whatever the consequences.”
“I see,” Trenholm concealed a smile, and then grew grave. “The usual ill-luck, apparently inseparable from the possession of great diamonds, has overtaken Paul,” he said sorrowfully. “He remained true to his trust and never parted with the jewel.Miss Ward,” with an abruptness which startled her from her study of Roberts, whose eyes had never left the diamond, “your uncle, M. Paltoff, gave the gem to Paul—they are both dead—what do you wish done with it?”
She could not prevent a shudder. “I cannot take it,” she protested. “Can you not turn it over to the Department of State and let the Government decide as to its disposition?”
“An excellent suggestion.” Trenholm, after replacing the diamond in its hiding place, secreted the watch carefully in an inside pocket. “Stand back, Roberts,” as the physician made an effort to wrench it from him. “You will go with the constable and Riley, but first,” his voice deepened, “how was it that you, supposedly a reputable physician and a man of honor, joined Zybinn in his endeavor to steal the Paltoff diamond?”
Roberts turned sullenly, the veneer gone; and a criminal, crafty and sinister-eyed, faced them.
“I am a drug addict,” he admitted. “I became so two years ago after a nervous breakdown. I was ship’s surgeon on the transport with Paul. He sent for me and I removed the diamond from the wound in his leg. I was straight then. My practice had fallen off; I was, in fact, a ruined man when, on a visit to Doctor Nash, I met Zybinn. He wormedPaul’s secret out of me, and promised, if I would steal the jewel, to give me half the value of the diamond. I knew he had money, for he had deposited a large fortune in a bank in Toronto before fleeing from Russia after a quarrel with Lenin. Zybinn pointed out that the diamond was too celebrated to be negotiable in the usual channels, and that, cut into smaller stones, it would lose most of its value, and so I agreed to his terms.”
“And why the stamp code?” asked Trenholm, as Roberts came to an abrupt halt.
“Doctor Nash had employed me to travel with Paul and keep him under observation, and it was thought wiser for Zybinn not to communicate directly with me,” Roberts turned to Miriam. “A glass of water, please.” Riley got it for him, before Miriam could move, from the pitcher placed for Mrs. Nash’s use on the bedstand.
Roberts looked over at Betty, a malignant grin distorting his face.
“Zybinn used you as a cat’s paw,” he said. “Through you he gained an intimate knowledge of Paul’s habits, his mode of life, and, using his remarkable powers of deduction, twice located the hiding place of the diamond—in each instance too late, for Paul’s capricious habits, his secretiveness, yes,” with grudging admiration, “his clevernessbalked us. And so did you,” wheeling on Mrs. Nash with a suddenness which made her jump. “I tried to secure the thirteenth letter on Tuesday night, but Martha detected me, and last night you pulled off my disguise.”
“Why did you risk discovery?” asked Mrs. Nash. “Why not have telegraphed to Zybinn for the message on his last letter?”
“I telephoned from Washington on Tuesday and was told he had died from apoplexy on Monday afternoon—his third stroke,” added Roberts. “That message on his letter to Paul was Zybinn’s last word to me. He thought I was still here at Abbott’s Lodge.”
“Just a moment,” broke in Trenholm. “Why did Zybinn use the words ‘thirteenth letter’ to designate the initial ‘M’ on the back of the watch?”
“Because in devising our code we failed to make provision for indicating an initial, expecting never to use one.” Roberts chafed one cold hand over the other. “Had I decoded Zybinn’s last message, I’d have gotten his meaning, however, for that little sketch is the only painting by Paul’s mother on the premises and always cherished by her son. He invariably spoke of the sketch as ‘The Suicide’s Grave.’”
“I told Zybinn that,” admitted Betty. “Great heavens! how I played into his hands—”
“Just so!” agreed Roberts with sneering emphasis. He straightened up, swayed slightly and recovered his balance with an effort. “Come,” addressing Trenholm, “I can stand no more.”
The constable was by his side and Riley at his heels instantly. “We’ll take him to Upper Marlboro, sir,” the former stated, and at a nod from Trenholm, Roberts, with eyes averted from his former friends, left the room, the black shroudlike cloth still thrown about his shoulders—typical in its vague outlines of the shadowed and complex nature of the man.
Mrs. Nash’s overcharged feelings found relief in tears. “There,” she exclaimed, as her distracted husband held a glass of water and Miriam the smelling salts. “I’ll be myself in a minute. Betty, come and tell me why you remained here, instead of returning to Washington with your uncle, and why you lied about your visit to Paul.”
Betty cleared her throat. “You were partly responsible—”
“I?” her aunt regarded her in astonishment.
“Yes. After leaving the house I remembered my promise to Uncle Alexander to telephone you whywe were detained, and while he was cranking the car, I jumped out and rang the bell. No one came and I waited and rang again. Looking around I saw that Uncle had driven off. I tried to overtake him and failed, so spent the night here in Paul’s garage, the door being unlocked. Martha found me there in the morning and gave me some breakfast. She told me Paul had been murdered. It was a frightful shock!” Betty drew in her breath. “And I lost my head and ran away; and, to make bad matters worse, denied my visit here.” She turned impulsively to Alan.
“You will never know the suffering I have endured since Monday,” she said, and her voice quivered with emotion. She read his expression, and a look of hope, of joy, flashed up in her face. “Am I forgiven?”
Alan’s arms were around her, his lips against hers. “You are loved,” he whispered. “Does not that cover all?” and he led her from the room.
Martha intercepted Miriam as she was on her way to her own room an hour later.
“He’s waiting downstairs,” she said, pointing in the direction of the living room.
“He?—Who?”
“Mr. Trenholm.” And Martha who, since Corbin’sarrest for complicity in Paul’s murder and for having narcotics concealed in his cache in the suicide’s grave, had kept carefully hidden in the kitchen closet, stole softly to bed.
Trenholm dropped the paper he was reading as Miriam paused in front of him, and sprang to his feet.
“I hoped that you would come,” he said. “Betty and Alan are in the sunparlor. In our talk they have cleared up the last threads of the mystery. It seems that Betty’s telegram to Paul was telephoned out from Upper Marlboro and Alan wrote it down on a slip of paper and gave it to him. It was to secure that paper, Betty thinking it a regular telegraph blank, that they both tried to search this house and my bungalow.”
“Mr. Abbott had a paper in his hand when he told me that Miss Carter would be here,” broke in Miriam.
“Ah, then he must have carried it with him into the sitting room, and dropped it on the way there,” replied Trenholm. “Pierre found it and took it to Mrs. Nash.”
A ghost of a smile hovered about Miriam’s lips. “I cannot help but like Mrs. Nash,” she confessed, then changed the subject swiftly. “What took Mr.Abbott into the sitting room when I went downstairs to admit Miss Carter and Doctor Nash?”
Trenholm shook his head. “We will never know, but I imagine it was some sixth sense which warned him of danger to the diamond—the gem seemed to exert a remarkable influence over him. Poor Paul!” Trenholm sighed. “His extraordinary will-power triumphed over physical disability and gave him strength to reach the sitting room.”
Miriam’s eyes filled with tears. “I cannot shake off a sense of responsibility for the tragedy—”
“Nonsense!” Trenholm spoke with the vehemence characteristic of him. “Never think that.”
Miriam’s smile did not dispel the shadow which saddened her expression.
“It is good-by, Mr. Trenholm,” she said, holding out her hand. “I leave for Washington early to-morrow.”
Trenholm’s hand closed over hers with a pressure that hurt.
“Good-by,” he repeated mechanically. “No, I can’t let you go out of my life; for you have become all in all to me.” As he met the gaze of her lovely eyes, his set speech, which he had rehearsed again and again while waiting to see her, flew out of his mind.
“Miriam, I have only love to offer—” His clear voice faltered. For a second they gazed steadfastly at each other, and the old, old story which never grows old was told again as Trenholm clasped Miriam to his heart and her lips met his in unconditional surrender.
THE END