Chapter XVII.The Case Is EndedSeveral hours later found us gathered in Carter's living room. It had been a very active two hours. Our first attention had been given to the secretary, for it needed but a glance to tell that the minister was beyond any aid of ours. We carried her to Carter's house, where his housekeeper placed her in bed, while we called the doctor. We had reached both the coroner and the chief of police, and when their duties had been completed, they had all gathered in Carter's house.We were a somber-looking group of men. The horror and nervous tension of the last few hours was still with us. No one felt very much at ease, and my eyes still saw the amazing scene in the boat house. The heavy face of the chief wore the most bewildered look I have ever seen, and it seemed as if he still found it impossible to believe all that had taken place. Only Ranville and Bartley appeared to be unmoved, and the Englishman's face wore an admiring look whenever he glanced at Bartley.It was the chief who voiced the thought which was in all our minds. He turned to Bartley, and his heavy voice asked the question we all wished answered.“Mr. Bartley,” he asked, “for God's sake, tell us how you doped out this thing. I can't believe yet the minister killed those two men. To save my life I can't see it.”Bartley started to speak, only to be interrupted by Carter's rising from his chair. Telling us he thought the chief would pardon us if we took a little drink, he left the room, returning in a moment. Under his arm was a three-sided bottle, and glasses clinked in his pockets. No one spoke while he poured out the Scotch, and very soberly we each took our drink. Then Carter turned to his friend.“Now, John,” was all he said.Fumbling in his pocket, Bartley found his cigar case and slowly lighted one of the long thin cigars he loved so well. Then, leaning far back in his chair, he turned to the chief.“As you know, Chief,” were his words, “the solving of any crime is oftentimes a matter of luck. It is not often we find clews scattered about which lead us directly to the criminal. Most murders are solved by very careful detail work by the police. Others are solved by sheer good fortune, and a few by what we might call a bit of psychology.”I saw Ranville nod his head in agreement, but the chief's face was a study. He started to say something, only to check himself as Bartley continued:“When I first read in the papers regarding the murder of Warren, my first thought was, the whole thing seemed incredible. Then I began to wonder what the motive might be. There must always be some kind of a motive for a murder. The crime is committed, of course, for many reasons. In the main, there are but three—robbery, revenge or sudden, frenzied passion. When I read the accounts of Warren's death, every one of these reasons seemed to be eliminated. In fact, the more I thought it over the less there seemed to be of any kind of motive.”He paused to relight his cigar; then went on:“Of course, the murder of a man of Warren's prominence was startling enough in itself. As a rule, men of his type are not murdered. Then I began to wonder. There seemed on the face of it but one logical explanation. Could he have been killed because of something he might have done in China, by some enemies he might have made while there? When Carter told me of the visit made by the Chinaman, I began to wonder if he might be the killer. In the end I decided that he could not have been.”“I don't see how you have decided that,” broke in the chief.“Two things formed my opinion. The cross upon the forehead was the first one. A Chinaman might have killed him, but if he did, he would not have marked the body after death with a cross. Then came the story of the box. We found there was a box of opium in the library. Patton's information regarding the boxes given Warren in China checked up with the story the Chinaman told. But one box of opium was not enough for a crime of that type. The Chinaman could have secured the box at the time he was first in the library; that is, if he had not been forced to leave.”“To leave?” questioned Carter.Bartley turned to his friend. “Carter, did you not think it rather queer that the Chinaman left the library as quickly as he did? He had discovered Warren was dead. To him that was of little account. But it seems that either he must have seen some one returning to the building or else heard some one near the room. One thing he could not afford to have happen: that was take any chance he would be accused of the murder. That's why he left.”I saw Ranville nod, and Bartley continued:“Patton told us that Mr. Warren never had the time to examine the gift of three boxes which had been given him at the last moment. The Chinaman told the truth. He was but an odd coincident in the case, but it was sufficient for a short while to throw us all away from the real motive. Then when I heard your stories, I began to have a faint suspicion—”“You did,” interrupted Carter. “Of what?”Bartley laughed. “A faint suspicion that perhaps you had not told me every single detail. As the affair stood, we were up against a stone wall. Warren had been killed—but there was no motive for the crime. Of course, that was absurd. I began to wonder if you had overlooked anything. And then I decided there was but one way I could see any light in this crime. It was to apply some modern psychology—try and discover the type of a man who would commit such an absurd murder. That is—it was to us, but to the murderer it was not. And then, all at once, you told me very clearly what type of a man I must look for.”“We did not,” was Carter's quick comment.“Do you remember that bit of paper you found near the body? That paper with the letters ‘Anani’?”We nodded.“For some reason none of you tried to figure out what those letters might mean. They did mean something, though the word was not completed. Did you ever hear of ‘Ananias’?”As the chief wrinkled up his brow in thought, Ranville brought his hand down on his knee and laughed. It was Carter who spoke, his voice impatient as he said:“Of course I did. He is in the Bible. Some sort of a liar who was struck dead.”“He is in the Bible, Carter,” was Bartley's smiling reply. “But I am a little surprised you knew it. The gentleman, as you remember, was struck dead—by God—for telling a lie. You carry those letters to their logical conclusion, and the word would have spelled out ‘Ananias.’ Our psychology will tell us the murderer used that name instead of writing out another word, ‘Liar.’ ”“But, Mr. Bartley,” broke in the chief, “of all damned foolishness that's the worst. No one could call Mr. Warren that sort of a name. He was one of the big men of the country. You are all wrong there.”“Wait a moment, Chief,” was the calm reply. “You have made the reply the average man would make. And even if an ordinary man killed Mr. Warren and thought he lied, he would not have used the word ‘Ananias’ to express that fact. It gave me my first clew to the type of man I wished to find. And there is something else you must remember—”As we bent forward in our chairs, his eyes swept slowly over us. His voice was very grave when he spoke.“Mr. Warren was one of the great men of our land—one of our greatest men of science. But you must remember that there are many millions of people in this country who would say that he was a ‘liar.’ Remember his statement when he came out of China? I have found the solution of the origin of man. The last proof of evolution has been discovered.”His eyes swept over us, and as no one spoke, he went on:“In every college in this world evolution is taught as the only logical explanation of the origin of man. Every intelligent person accepts it. You know, however, that in America to-day there is a great campaign against the subject. In fact, there is a campaign against science as being ‘ungodly.’ Take a rabid, bigoted man who is uneducated—one who sees in science an attack upon religion and the Bible—and you will find a man who would say Warren was what that word implied—a ‘liar.’ ”Ranville's face was very grave as his eyes rested upon Bartley. Without waiting for a reply, Bartley said very gravely:“I have often wondered just how far you could carry on a campaign of hatred and untruths without reaping a fearful penalty. We have been breeding intolerance in America for years. All over our country, in the south and in the west, men are at the present time carrying on a campaign against the teaching of science. They are inflaming the minds of simple people in what they call a great crusade. In the end you cannot breed intolerance and hatred without some time having to reap the full penalty. Warren paid the price of that campaign of misrepresentation. It has happened before. Intolerance—breeding hatred—and then in an unbalanced mind flaming out in violence.“I began to wonder if perhaps I had not found the type who would commit such a crime, and also the motive. When you told me of the faint cross cut into the head of the dead man, I knew that we were dealing with an unbalanced mind.”He paused and lighted a fresh cigar; then added:“And the night the minister came here I began to wonder if he might be the man. This afternoon I was sure of it.”At our questioning glances he informed us as to what had made him suspicious. He reminded us that the minister had broken out in a rather wild attack upon what he said was the fact that evolution was responsible for people not going to church. Then he added that when the clergyman had expressed his opinion that Warren's discoveries could not be given to the world, he had been corrected by Carter's statement that Mr. Warren's assistant was coming to finish the book.He remarked that only the fact he was suspicious of the man, perhaps caused him to notice the look which passed over his face when he made his statement regarding Patton. It was a look of consternation and of hatred. From that moment he had begun to have his suspicions regarding the minister. One other thing convinced him they were true.The chief had been following Bartley's story with the closest attention. In part, I believed that he was not sure Bartley's reasoning was correct. I could see the puzzled look sweep across his face, and once or twice he shook his head as if he did not agree. It was his voice which asked:“What was the other thing?”“Pelt and I were in the minister's study this afternoon. I made my call at a time I knew he was out. I had seen him go down the lake in his boat. There was nothing very much out of the way in his study—that is, on first glance. His books were mostly controversial theological works, and a good many of them were attacks upon evolution. But in a bookcase which had a glass door covered by cloth I found something else. To start with, the books in the case were a weird mixture. There were a great many books upon flagellation—the worst sort of books. Then there were a number dealing with the celebrated Girard case. That was a famous case of sadism under the guise of religion. Also there were the five pamphlets which covered the Lepworth school matter.”There came a short expression from Ranville. As the rest of us looked blankly at the two men, Bartley enlightened us.“The Lepworth school affair is a very celebrated case in the realm of sexual psychology. The schoolmaster, a young man named Woods, aroused England over sixty years ago by the brutal and cruel punishments he inflicted upon his pupils. He managed to escape to America. There is no doubt the man was sexually unbalanced. To-day we would call it a pathological condition. But standing on that shelf was a genealogy of the Woods family—that branch of it. And that schoolmaster, who had to flee England, was the grandfather of the minister.“Now I do not know much about Woods. He was forced out of England and came to this country. He made money, we do know. But the fact he built this church tells a good deal. It was, no doubt, his gesture to the Almighty—his attempt to win forgiveness for the sins of the flesh. To-day we know another thing. Any textbook upon heredity will tell you that children inherit their qualities more from their grandparents than their parents. And here was the minister, and in his blood was that unbalanced make-up of the English schoolmaster. In his case it made him a bigot without friends and also whipped him into queer reform movements. It also explains the horrible books I found in his case. And I might add that I found the missing volumes of the De Sade.“The genealogy told more. The minister's father married a woman named Wright. After the minister was born she was placed in an insane asylum, where she died. You can see from the standpoint of heredity what took place. The sadistic strain in the blood of the grandfather mixed in the unbalanced blood of the woman—and the minister was the result. From such a type you look for your odd reforms—your fantastic crimes.”In the silence which followed there came the plaintive voice of the chief:“But still I don't understand why he killed Warren.”“Well,” came Bartley's voice, “let us start at the beginning. Here you have the minister. His heredity is very bad. His entire life, that is, the things he did, showed that he was a sad neurotic. He hated pleasure; he hated all things which normal people enjoy. In fact most of the wild, rabid fanatics are the same type. But with him there was a double danger.“We know to-day that there is not much difference between the person who reacts violently in a sexual manner and the one who goes to a wild extreme in religious matters. Our psychology has proven they are alike, from hundreds of cases. You had here an unbalanced man. The anti-evolution group, of which he was a member, had read Warren's statement—the last proof of evolution had been found. Now to him that would be absurd; and, at the same time, he would look upon Warren as an enemy of God.“Let us suppose he brooded over the matter day after day. He might have even prayed that Warren would be found wrong. Then to add flame to his unbalanced thoughts came the news that Warren was to write his book in the very place where the minister lived. That did not improve matters. So one day he went to see Warren. I think I can picture what happened.”“What?” came the chief's eager voice.“I think the minister went into Warren's library with the purpose of begging that he would not publish his book. In his unbalanced mind he would see nothing out of the way in such a request. You can picture what Warren must have said. It was like oil to a flame. As the minister looked at the scientist he would see him as the very enemy of society. Then, without a doubt, something snapped in his brain. He rose to say ‘good-by’ and suddenly stabbed him. In his first wild frenzy he thought of himself as doing the work of God. The cross was a symbol of that. And when he wrote the word ‘Ananias,’ the same thought was in his mind.“Just what happened after that we do not know. His frenzy would not last long. Remember he was not technically insane—only unbalanced upon several things, with a warped mind. It is my opinion he went away and then returned later. Perhaps he remembered the door was open. Perhaps when he came to his right mind, he realized what he had done and went back to see if he left a clew. And then it was he who must have broken the bookcase to take those books—books he must have often heard of, but was unable to secure.”At that moment there came a voice from the doorway:“May I come in?”We turned to see the secretary. She was wearing a gay-colored dressing gown which must have belonged to Carter. Her face was rather pale, but otherwise she showed little signs of the experience she had been through. We rose to our feet, and Ranville found her a chair. She dropped into it and smiled faintly as she turned to Carter:“Did you telephone my aunt?” she asked anxiously.Carter rose with a jump and said sheepishly that he had never thought of it. As he started for the door the girl stopped him, saying that no doubt the chief would be willing to take her home in a few moments. The chief agreed to this, but said he wanted to hear what had happened to her.Her story was a very brief one. She had gone home to her supper and, when it was over, returned to the library. As she came up the steps of the building, to her great surprise, she heard a shot within. She rushed to the door and went a few feet within the room. To her consternation, the minister was near the desk and in his hand was a gun. He turned at her cry.She gave a shudder at the recollection. His face was a vivid red, and his eyes blazed as he looked at her. She said that she thought he was crazy. With a weird cry, as she turned to run from the room, he made a dash after her. Just as his hand was about to fall upon her, she must have fainted, for she remembered no more until she came to in the boat house—alone.Though she tried to open the two doors of the room, she discovered they were locked on the outside. She yelled as loud as she could, but the approaching storm and the high wind drowned her voice. And then when she thought it would be useless to cry out again, she heard the door open. A moment later the door leading into the room was swung aside, and the lights flashed on. Just what happened after that she did not know. There was a short moment when, to her horror, she again saw the minister—saw him creep over the floor in her direction—and then she said she must have fainted again.We said nothing, and then with an appealing look, which took us all in, the girl asked:“I have just one faint recollection. As I fainted the last time, the minister was saying something about a sacrifice. What did he mean?”It was Bartley who spoke, and his words were, of course, untrue:“I think you must have been mistaken,” was his short reply.The girl shook her head as if in doubt, but settled back in her chair. In the silence there came the voice of the chief:“How about the murder of the gardener?”“That's more simple,” was the answer. “You must, of course, understand, Chief, that when the minister realized what he had done, he was torn between two conflicting emotions. First, of course, was the thought that he had done a good deed—he had saved his God from blasphemy. That idea grew upon him. It did not, however, do away with the other feeling. After all, he had committed a murder, and he knew it. In the few days after the crime he must have been fast approaching actual insanity.“Then there came a startling fact. He was told that Patton would complete the book—the book which would give the world Warren's discovery. He had killed a man to prevent that book being written, and his crime was in vain. The world collapsed for him at the moment he realized that his crime had been useless.”“But he did not know Patton,” barked out the chief.“Yes, he did,” replied Carter. “I introduced them this morning.”Bartley took up the thought. “Yes, he had met him. That's why he made his mistake. He knew the suit Patton was wearing. When he saw the back of the gardener as he turned to escape from the room, he thought it was Patton and shot him. In build, height and general appearance they were about the same.”“No doubt it's all so,” retorted the chief, “but what I can't understand is this: What did the gardener see, what was it made him turn, as you say, to leave the library?”“He must have seen the minister destroying the manuscript on the desk. He tried to get out of the room without being heard in order to tell Patton. And he was shot. As Miss Harlan screamed, the minister rushed at her. Her fainting no doubt saved her life. He took her down to the boat, then to the boat house. The rest you know. In that startled moment when the eyes of the murderer fell upon Patton, and he saw his victim standing before him, he realized he had killed the wrong man. His heart could not stand the strain.”“That was lucky for him,” was the chief's dry comment. “But, at that, he was crazy.”“Yes—and—no,” was Bartley's reply. “In the beginning he simply was a neurotic—unbalanced, not insane. In the end the conflict between his two selves drove him insane. If you mean he was insane the last few hours of his life, I agree with you.”Silence fell, which the chief broke to say that he thought he better return to town. The secretary went up to her room to dress, returning in a few moments. At the door she turned to thank us, and then said good night. We stood for a moment in the open door and watched the car leave the drive; then went back into the house. As we moved rather nervously about the room, Carter paused and asked:“John, what would that man have done to that girl if we had not reached the boat house?”“Killed her. You remember his repeated cry—a sacrifice—a sacrifice. His mind was gone then. Upon his conscience, if he had any, were two murders. Dimly he wished to make his peace with God, and he remembered the idea which runs through so much theology—the sacrifice of blood. He would have killed her as an offering—the offering which his unbalanced mind thought was demanded.”The thought was a horrible one, and I gave a little shiver. As the men sank down into their chairs, there came a silence which no one broke. In it again I heard the weird tones of the organ as my mind went back to the moments I had spent in the church balcony. I shuddered as I thought of the frenzied voice of the minister with his wild cry for a sacrifice. And then my eyes fell upon Ranville.He was sitting in a chair by the table. His face was very thoughtful, and once or twice I saw him knit his brows. As he lifted his head, our eyes met for a second. Then his glance strayed over to the table. On its surface was the bottle of Scotch. His hand went forth, and he poured out a small drink. Holding the glass in his hand, he turned to Bartley:“Well, Mr. Bartley, you pulled it off. But there is one thing I wish to tell you.”We turned to look at the Englishman's face. There was a little twinkle in his eyes, and a smile played over his face. He raised his glass to his lips after a gesture in Bartley's direction. Then, as he drained it, he said, and there was a laughing note in his voice:“You pulled it off. But do you know I think the Yard could have done the same thing?”The End
Several hours later found us gathered in Carter's living room. It had been a very active two hours. Our first attention had been given to the secretary, for it needed but a glance to tell that the minister was beyond any aid of ours. We carried her to Carter's house, where his housekeeper placed her in bed, while we called the doctor. We had reached both the coroner and the chief of police, and when their duties had been completed, they had all gathered in Carter's house.
We were a somber-looking group of men. The horror and nervous tension of the last few hours was still with us. No one felt very much at ease, and my eyes still saw the amazing scene in the boat house. The heavy face of the chief wore the most bewildered look I have ever seen, and it seemed as if he still found it impossible to believe all that had taken place. Only Ranville and Bartley appeared to be unmoved, and the Englishman's face wore an admiring look whenever he glanced at Bartley.
It was the chief who voiced the thought which was in all our minds. He turned to Bartley, and his heavy voice asked the question we all wished answered.
“Mr. Bartley,” he asked, “for God's sake, tell us how you doped out this thing. I can't believe yet the minister killed those two men. To save my life I can't see it.”
Bartley started to speak, only to be interrupted by Carter's rising from his chair. Telling us he thought the chief would pardon us if we took a little drink, he left the room, returning in a moment. Under his arm was a three-sided bottle, and glasses clinked in his pockets. No one spoke while he poured out the Scotch, and very soberly we each took our drink. Then Carter turned to his friend.
“Now, John,” was all he said.
Fumbling in his pocket, Bartley found his cigar case and slowly lighted one of the long thin cigars he loved so well. Then, leaning far back in his chair, he turned to the chief.
“As you know, Chief,” were his words, “the solving of any crime is oftentimes a matter of luck. It is not often we find clews scattered about which lead us directly to the criminal. Most murders are solved by very careful detail work by the police. Others are solved by sheer good fortune, and a few by what we might call a bit of psychology.”
I saw Ranville nod his head in agreement, but the chief's face was a study. He started to say something, only to check himself as Bartley continued:
“When I first read in the papers regarding the murder of Warren, my first thought was, the whole thing seemed incredible. Then I began to wonder what the motive might be. There must always be some kind of a motive for a murder. The crime is committed, of course, for many reasons. In the main, there are but three—robbery, revenge or sudden, frenzied passion. When I read the accounts of Warren's death, every one of these reasons seemed to be eliminated. In fact, the more I thought it over the less there seemed to be of any kind of motive.”
He paused to relight his cigar; then went on:
“Of course, the murder of a man of Warren's prominence was startling enough in itself. As a rule, men of his type are not murdered. Then I began to wonder. There seemed on the face of it but one logical explanation. Could he have been killed because of something he might have done in China, by some enemies he might have made while there? When Carter told me of the visit made by the Chinaman, I began to wonder if he might be the killer. In the end I decided that he could not have been.”
“I don't see how you have decided that,” broke in the chief.
“Two things formed my opinion. The cross upon the forehead was the first one. A Chinaman might have killed him, but if he did, he would not have marked the body after death with a cross. Then came the story of the box. We found there was a box of opium in the library. Patton's information regarding the boxes given Warren in China checked up with the story the Chinaman told. But one box of opium was not enough for a crime of that type. The Chinaman could have secured the box at the time he was first in the library; that is, if he had not been forced to leave.”
“To leave?” questioned Carter.
Bartley turned to his friend. “Carter, did you not think it rather queer that the Chinaman left the library as quickly as he did? He had discovered Warren was dead. To him that was of little account. But it seems that either he must have seen some one returning to the building or else heard some one near the room. One thing he could not afford to have happen: that was take any chance he would be accused of the murder. That's why he left.”
I saw Ranville nod, and Bartley continued:
“Patton told us that Mr. Warren never had the time to examine the gift of three boxes which had been given him at the last moment. The Chinaman told the truth. He was but an odd coincident in the case, but it was sufficient for a short while to throw us all away from the real motive. Then when I heard your stories, I began to have a faint suspicion—”
“You did,” interrupted Carter. “Of what?”
Bartley laughed. “A faint suspicion that perhaps you had not told me every single detail. As the affair stood, we were up against a stone wall. Warren had been killed—but there was no motive for the crime. Of course, that was absurd. I began to wonder if you had overlooked anything. And then I decided there was but one way I could see any light in this crime. It was to apply some modern psychology—try and discover the type of a man who would commit such an absurd murder. That is—it was to us, but to the murderer it was not. And then, all at once, you told me very clearly what type of a man I must look for.”
“We did not,” was Carter's quick comment.
“Do you remember that bit of paper you found near the body? That paper with the letters ‘Anani’?”
We nodded.
“For some reason none of you tried to figure out what those letters might mean. They did mean something, though the word was not completed. Did you ever hear of ‘Ananias’?”
As the chief wrinkled up his brow in thought, Ranville brought his hand down on his knee and laughed. It was Carter who spoke, his voice impatient as he said:
“Of course I did. He is in the Bible. Some sort of a liar who was struck dead.”
“He is in the Bible, Carter,” was Bartley's smiling reply. “But I am a little surprised you knew it. The gentleman, as you remember, was struck dead—by God—for telling a lie. You carry those letters to their logical conclusion, and the word would have spelled out ‘Ananias.’ Our psychology will tell us the murderer used that name instead of writing out another word, ‘Liar.’ ”
“But, Mr. Bartley,” broke in the chief, “of all damned foolishness that's the worst. No one could call Mr. Warren that sort of a name. He was one of the big men of the country. You are all wrong there.”
“Wait a moment, Chief,” was the calm reply. “You have made the reply the average man would make. And even if an ordinary man killed Mr. Warren and thought he lied, he would not have used the word ‘Ananias’ to express that fact. It gave me my first clew to the type of man I wished to find. And there is something else you must remember—”
As we bent forward in our chairs, his eyes swept slowly over us. His voice was very grave when he spoke.
“Mr. Warren was one of the great men of our land—one of our greatest men of science. But you must remember that there are many millions of people in this country who would say that he was a ‘liar.’ Remember his statement when he came out of China? I have found the solution of the origin of man. The last proof of evolution has been discovered.”
His eyes swept over us, and as no one spoke, he went on:
“In every college in this world evolution is taught as the only logical explanation of the origin of man. Every intelligent person accepts it. You know, however, that in America to-day there is a great campaign against the subject. In fact, there is a campaign against science as being ‘ungodly.’ Take a rabid, bigoted man who is uneducated—one who sees in science an attack upon religion and the Bible—and you will find a man who would say Warren was what that word implied—a ‘liar.’ ”
Ranville's face was very grave as his eyes rested upon Bartley. Without waiting for a reply, Bartley said very gravely:
“I have often wondered just how far you could carry on a campaign of hatred and untruths without reaping a fearful penalty. We have been breeding intolerance in America for years. All over our country, in the south and in the west, men are at the present time carrying on a campaign against the teaching of science. They are inflaming the minds of simple people in what they call a great crusade. In the end you cannot breed intolerance and hatred without some time having to reap the full penalty. Warren paid the price of that campaign of misrepresentation. It has happened before. Intolerance—breeding hatred—and then in an unbalanced mind flaming out in violence.
“I began to wonder if perhaps I had not found the type who would commit such a crime, and also the motive. When you told me of the faint cross cut into the head of the dead man, I knew that we were dealing with an unbalanced mind.”
He paused and lighted a fresh cigar; then added:
“And the night the minister came here I began to wonder if he might be the man. This afternoon I was sure of it.”
At our questioning glances he informed us as to what had made him suspicious. He reminded us that the minister had broken out in a rather wild attack upon what he said was the fact that evolution was responsible for people not going to church. Then he added that when the clergyman had expressed his opinion that Warren's discoveries could not be given to the world, he had been corrected by Carter's statement that Mr. Warren's assistant was coming to finish the book.
He remarked that only the fact he was suspicious of the man, perhaps caused him to notice the look which passed over his face when he made his statement regarding Patton. It was a look of consternation and of hatred. From that moment he had begun to have his suspicions regarding the minister. One other thing convinced him they were true.
The chief had been following Bartley's story with the closest attention. In part, I believed that he was not sure Bartley's reasoning was correct. I could see the puzzled look sweep across his face, and once or twice he shook his head as if he did not agree. It was his voice which asked:
“What was the other thing?”
“Pelt and I were in the minister's study this afternoon. I made my call at a time I knew he was out. I had seen him go down the lake in his boat. There was nothing very much out of the way in his study—that is, on first glance. His books were mostly controversial theological works, and a good many of them were attacks upon evolution. But in a bookcase which had a glass door covered by cloth I found something else. To start with, the books in the case were a weird mixture. There were a great many books upon flagellation—the worst sort of books. Then there were a number dealing with the celebrated Girard case. That was a famous case of sadism under the guise of religion. Also there were the five pamphlets which covered the Lepworth school matter.”
There came a short expression from Ranville. As the rest of us looked blankly at the two men, Bartley enlightened us.
“The Lepworth school affair is a very celebrated case in the realm of sexual psychology. The schoolmaster, a young man named Woods, aroused England over sixty years ago by the brutal and cruel punishments he inflicted upon his pupils. He managed to escape to America. There is no doubt the man was sexually unbalanced. To-day we would call it a pathological condition. But standing on that shelf was a genealogy of the Woods family—that branch of it. And that schoolmaster, who had to flee England, was the grandfather of the minister.
“Now I do not know much about Woods. He was forced out of England and came to this country. He made money, we do know. But the fact he built this church tells a good deal. It was, no doubt, his gesture to the Almighty—his attempt to win forgiveness for the sins of the flesh. To-day we know another thing. Any textbook upon heredity will tell you that children inherit their qualities more from their grandparents than their parents. And here was the minister, and in his blood was that unbalanced make-up of the English schoolmaster. In his case it made him a bigot without friends and also whipped him into queer reform movements. It also explains the horrible books I found in his case. And I might add that I found the missing volumes of the De Sade.
“The genealogy told more. The minister's father married a woman named Wright. After the minister was born she was placed in an insane asylum, where she died. You can see from the standpoint of heredity what took place. The sadistic strain in the blood of the grandfather mixed in the unbalanced blood of the woman—and the minister was the result. From such a type you look for your odd reforms—your fantastic crimes.”
In the silence which followed there came the plaintive voice of the chief:
“But still I don't understand why he killed Warren.”
“Well,” came Bartley's voice, “let us start at the beginning. Here you have the minister. His heredity is very bad. His entire life, that is, the things he did, showed that he was a sad neurotic. He hated pleasure; he hated all things which normal people enjoy. In fact most of the wild, rabid fanatics are the same type. But with him there was a double danger.
“We know to-day that there is not much difference between the person who reacts violently in a sexual manner and the one who goes to a wild extreme in religious matters. Our psychology has proven they are alike, from hundreds of cases. You had here an unbalanced man. The anti-evolution group, of which he was a member, had read Warren's statement—the last proof of evolution had been found. Now to him that would be absurd; and, at the same time, he would look upon Warren as an enemy of God.
“Let us suppose he brooded over the matter day after day. He might have even prayed that Warren would be found wrong. Then to add flame to his unbalanced thoughts came the news that Warren was to write his book in the very place where the minister lived. That did not improve matters. So one day he went to see Warren. I think I can picture what happened.”
“What?” came the chief's eager voice.
“I think the minister went into Warren's library with the purpose of begging that he would not publish his book. In his unbalanced mind he would see nothing out of the way in such a request. You can picture what Warren must have said. It was like oil to a flame. As the minister looked at the scientist he would see him as the very enemy of society. Then, without a doubt, something snapped in his brain. He rose to say ‘good-by’ and suddenly stabbed him. In his first wild frenzy he thought of himself as doing the work of God. The cross was a symbol of that. And when he wrote the word ‘Ananias,’ the same thought was in his mind.
“Just what happened after that we do not know. His frenzy would not last long. Remember he was not technically insane—only unbalanced upon several things, with a warped mind. It is my opinion he went away and then returned later. Perhaps he remembered the door was open. Perhaps when he came to his right mind, he realized what he had done and went back to see if he left a clew. And then it was he who must have broken the bookcase to take those books—books he must have often heard of, but was unable to secure.”
At that moment there came a voice from the doorway:
“May I come in?”
We turned to see the secretary. She was wearing a gay-colored dressing gown which must have belonged to Carter. Her face was rather pale, but otherwise she showed little signs of the experience she had been through. We rose to our feet, and Ranville found her a chair. She dropped into it and smiled faintly as she turned to Carter:
“Did you telephone my aunt?” she asked anxiously.
Carter rose with a jump and said sheepishly that he had never thought of it. As he started for the door the girl stopped him, saying that no doubt the chief would be willing to take her home in a few moments. The chief agreed to this, but said he wanted to hear what had happened to her.
Her story was a very brief one. She had gone home to her supper and, when it was over, returned to the library. As she came up the steps of the building, to her great surprise, she heard a shot within. She rushed to the door and went a few feet within the room. To her consternation, the minister was near the desk and in his hand was a gun. He turned at her cry.
She gave a shudder at the recollection. His face was a vivid red, and his eyes blazed as he looked at her. She said that she thought he was crazy. With a weird cry, as she turned to run from the room, he made a dash after her. Just as his hand was about to fall upon her, she must have fainted, for she remembered no more until she came to in the boat house—alone.
Though she tried to open the two doors of the room, she discovered they were locked on the outside. She yelled as loud as she could, but the approaching storm and the high wind drowned her voice. And then when she thought it would be useless to cry out again, she heard the door open. A moment later the door leading into the room was swung aside, and the lights flashed on. Just what happened after that she did not know. There was a short moment when, to her horror, she again saw the minister—saw him creep over the floor in her direction—and then she said she must have fainted again.
We said nothing, and then with an appealing look, which took us all in, the girl asked:
“I have just one faint recollection. As I fainted the last time, the minister was saying something about a sacrifice. What did he mean?”
It was Bartley who spoke, and his words were, of course, untrue:
“I think you must have been mistaken,” was his short reply.
The girl shook her head as if in doubt, but settled back in her chair. In the silence there came the voice of the chief:
“How about the murder of the gardener?”
“That's more simple,” was the answer. “You must, of course, understand, Chief, that when the minister realized what he had done, he was torn between two conflicting emotions. First, of course, was the thought that he had done a good deed—he had saved his God from blasphemy. That idea grew upon him. It did not, however, do away with the other feeling. After all, he had committed a murder, and he knew it. In the few days after the crime he must have been fast approaching actual insanity.
“Then there came a startling fact. He was told that Patton would complete the book—the book which would give the world Warren's discovery. He had killed a man to prevent that book being written, and his crime was in vain. The world collapsed for him at the moment he realized that his crime had been useless.”
“But he did not know Patton,” barked out the chief.
“Yes, he did,” replied Carter. “I introduced them this morning.”
Bartley took up the thought. “Yes, he had met him. That's why he made his mistake. He knew the suit Patton was wearing. When he saw the back of the gardener as he turned to escape from the room, he thought it was Patton and shot him. In build, height and general appearance they were about the same.”
“No doubt it's all so,” retorted the chief, “but what I can't understand is this: What did the gardener see, what was it made him turn, as you say, to leave the library?”
“He must have seen the minister destroying the manuscript on the desk. He tried to get out of the room without being heard in order to tell Patton. And he was shot. As Miss Harlan screamed, the minister rushed at her. Her fainting no doubt saved her life. He took her down to the boat, then to the boat house. The rest you know. In that startled moment when the eyes of the murderer fell upon Patton, and he saw his victim standing before him, he realized he had killed the wrong man. His heart could not stand the strain.”
“That was lucky for him,” was the chief's dry comment. “But, at that, he was crazy.”
“Yes—and—no,” was Bartley's reply. “In the beginning he simply was a neurotic—unbalanced, not insane. In the end the conflict between his two selves drove him insane. If you mean he was insane the last few hours of his life, I agree with you.”
Silence fell, which the chief broke to say that he thought he better return to town. The secretary went up to her room to dress, returning in a few moments. At the door she turned to thank us, and then said good night. We stood for a moment in the open door and watched the car leave the drive; then went back into the house. As we moved rather nervously about the room, Carter paused and asked:
“John, what would that man have done to that girl if we had not reached the boat house?”
“Killed her. You remember his repeated cry—a sacrifice—a sacrifice. His mind was gone then. Upon his conscience, if he had any, were two murders. Dimly he wished to make his peace with God, and he remembered the idea which runs through so much theology—the sacrifice of blood. He would have killed her as an offering—the offering which his unbalanced mind thought was demanded.”
The thought was a horrible one, and I gave a little shiver. As the men sank down into their chairs, there came a silence which no one broke. In it again I heard the weird tones of the organ as my mind went back to the moments I had spent in the church balcony. I shuddered as I thought of the frenzied voice of the minister with his wild cry for a sacrifice. And then my eyes fell upon Ranville.
He was sitting in a chair by the table. His face was very thoughtful, and once or twice I saw him knit his brows. As he lifted his head, our eyes met for a second. Then his glance strayed over to the table. On its surface was the bottle of Scotch. His hand went forth, and he poured out a small drink. Holding the glass in his hand, he turned to Bartley:
“Well, Mr. Bartley, you pulled it off. But there is one thing I wish to tell you.”
We turned to look at the Englishman's face. There was a little twinkle in his eyes, and a smile played over his face. He raised his glass to his lips after a gesture in Bartley's direction. Then, as he drained it, he said, and there was a laughing note in his voice:
“You pulled it off. But do you know I think the Yard could have done the same thing?”
The End