Chapter V: Book TWO: Sweetwater to the Front (1)

IX

“WE KNOW OF NO SUCH LETTER”

O, he sits high in all the people’s hearts; And that, which would appear offence in us, His countenance like richest alchemy Will change to virtue, and to worthiness.

_Julius Caesar_.

“And you still hold him?”

“Yes, but with growing uncertainty. He’s one of those fellows who affect your judgment in spite of yourself. Handsome beyond the ordinary, a finished gentleman and all that, he has, in addition to these advantages, a way with him that goes straight to the heart in spite of prejudice and the claims of conscience. That’s a dangerous factor in a case like this. It hampers a man in the exercise of his duties. You may escape the fascination, probably will; but at least you will understand my present position and why I telephoned to New York for an expert detective to help us on this job. I wish to give the son of my old friend a chance.”

The man whom Coroner Perry thus addressed, leaned back in his chair and quietly replied:

“You’re right; not because he’s the son of your old friend, a handsome fellow and all that, but for the reason that every man should have his full chance, whatever the appearances against him. Personally, I have no fear of my judgment being affected by his attractions. I’ve had to do with too many handsome scamps for that. But I shall be as just to him as you will, simply because it seems an incredibly brutal crime for a gentleman to commit, and also because I lay greater stress than you do on the two or three minor points which seem to favour his latest declaration, that a man had preceded him in his visit to this lonely club-house,--a man whom he had himself seen leaving the grounds in a cutter just as he entered by the opposite driveway.”

“Ah!” came in quick ejaculation from the coroner’s lips, “I like to hear you say that. I was purposely careful not to lay emphasis on the facts you allude to. I wished you to draw your own inferences, without any aid from me. The police did find traces of a second horse and cutter having passed through the club-house grounds. It was snowing hard, and these traces were speedily obliterated, but Hexford and Clarke saw them in time to satisfy themselves that they extended from the northern clump of trees to the upper gateway where they took the direction of the Hill.”

“That is not all. A grip-sack, packed for travelling, was in Mr. Ranelagh’s cutter, showing that his story of an intended journey was not without some foundation.”

“Yes. We have retained that grip-sack. It is not the only proof we have of his intention to leave the city for a while. He had made other arrangements, business arrangements--But that’s neither here nor there. No one doubts that he planned an elopement with the beautiful Carmel; the question is, was his disappointment followed by the murder of the woman who stood in his way?”

District Attorney Fox (you will have guessed his identity before now) took his time, deliberating carefully with himself before venturing to reply. Then when the coroner’s concealed impatience was about to disclose itself, he quietly remarked:

“I suppose that no conclusion can be drawn from the condition of the body when our men reached it. I judge that it was still warm.”

“Yes, but so it would have been if she had met her fate several minutes earlier than was supposed. Clarke and Hexford differ about the length of time which intervened between the moment when the former looked into the room from the outside and that of their final entrance. But whether it was five minutes or ten, the period was long enough to render their testimony uncertain as to the exact length of time she had lain there dead. Had I been there--But it’s useless to go into that. Let us take up something more tangible.”

“Very good. Here it is. Of the six bottles of spirits which were surreptitiously taken from the club-house’s wine-vault, four were found standing unopened on the kitchen table. Where are the other two?”

“That’s it! That’s the question I have put myself ever since I interrogated the steward and found him ready to swear to the correctness of his report and the disappearance of these two bottles. Ranelagh did not empty them, or the bottles themselves would have been found somewhere about the place. Now, who did?”

“No one within the club-house precincts. They were opened and emptied elsewhere. There’s our clew and if the man you’ve got up from New York is worth his salt, he has his task ready to hand.”

“A hard task for a stranger--and such a stranger! Not very prepossessing, to say the least. But he has a good eye, and will get along with the boys all right. Nothing assertive about him; not enough go, perhaps. Would you like to see him?”

“In a moment. I want to clear my mind in reference to these bottles. Only some one addicted to drink would drag those six bottles out of that cold, unlighted cellar.”

“Yes, and a connoisseur at that. The two missing bottles held the choicest brand in the whole stock. They were kept far back too--hidden, as it were, behind the other bottles. Yet they were hauled to the front and carried off, as you say, and by some one who knows a good thing in spirits.”

“What was in the four bottles found on the kitchen table?”

“Sherry, whiskey, and rum. Two bottles of rum and one each of sherry and whiskey.”

“The thief meant to carry them all off, but had not time.”

“The _gentleman_ thief! No common man such as we are looking for, would make choice of just those bottles. So there we are again! Contradictions in every direction.”

“Don’t let us bother with the contradictions, but just follow the clew. Those bottles, full or empty, must be found. You know the labels?”

“Yes, and the shape and colour of the bottles, both of which are peculiar.”

“Good! Now let us see your detective.”

But Sweetwater was not called in yet. Just as Coroner Perry offered to touch his bell, the door opened and Mr. Clifton was ushered in. Well and favourably known to both men, he had no difficulty in stating his business and preferring his request.

“I am here in the interests of Elwood Ranelagh,” said he. “He is willing to concede, and so am I, that under the circumstances his arrest was justifiable, but not his prolonged detention. He has little excuse to offer for the mistakes he has made, or the various offences of which he has been guilty. His best friends must condemn his hypocrisy and fast-and-loose treatment of Miss Cumberland; but he vows that he had no hand in her violent death, and in this regard I feel not only bound but forced to believe him. At all events, I am going to act on that conviction, and have come here to entreat your aid in clearing up one or two points which may affect your own opinion of his guilt.

“As his counsel I have been able to extract from him a fact or two which he has hitherto withheld from the police. Reticent as he has shown himself from the start,--and considering the character of the two women involved in this tragedy, this cannot be looked upon as entirely to his discredit,--he has confided to me a circumstance, which in the excitement attendant on Miss Carmel Cumberland’s sudden illness, may have escaped the notice of the family and very naturally, of the police. It is this:

“The ring which Miss Cumberland wore as the sign and seal of her engagement to him was not on her hand when he came upon her, as he declares he did, dead. It was there at dinner-time--a curious ring which I have often noted myself and could accurately describe if required. If she took it off before starting for The Whispering Pines, it should be easily found. But if she did not, what a clew it offers to her unknown assailant! Up till now, Mr. Ranelagh has been anticipating receiving this ring back in a letter, written before she left her home. But he has heard of no such letter, and doubts now if you have. May I ask if he is correct in this surmise?”

“We know of no such letter. None has come to his rooms,” replied the coroner.

“I thought not. The whereabouts of this ring, then, is still to be determined. You will pardon my having called your attention to it. As Mr. Ranelagh’s legal adviser, I am very anxious to have that ring found.”

“We are glad to receive your suggestion,” replied the district attorney. “But you must remember that some of its force is lost by its having originated with the accused.”

“Very true; but Mr. Ranelagh was only induced to speak of this matter after I had worked with him for an hour. There is a mystery in his attitude which I, for one, have not yet fathomed. You must have noticed this also, Coroner Perry? Your inquest, when you hold it, will reveal some curious facts; but I doubt if it will reveal the secret underlying this man’s reticence. That we shall have to discover for ourselves.”

“He has another secret, then, than the one involving his arrest as a suspected murderer?” was the subtle conclusion of the district attorney.

“Yes, or why does he balk so at the simplest inquiries? I have my notion as to its nature; but I’m not here to express notions unless you call my almost unfounded belief in him a notion. What I want to present to you is fact, and fact which can be utilised.”

“In the cause of your client!”

“Which is equally the cause of justice.”

“Possibly. We’ll search for the ring, Mr. Clifton.”

“Meanwhile, will you cast your eye over these fragments of a note which Mr. Ranelagh says he received from Miss Carmel Cumberland while waiting on the station platform for her coming.”

Taking an envelope from his pocket, Mr. Clifton drew forth two small scraps of soiled and crumpled paper, one of which was the half of another envelope presenting very nearly the following appearance:

As he pointed this out, he remarked:

“Elwood is not so common a baptismal name, that there can be any doubt as to the person addressed.”

The other scraps, also written in pencil and by the same hand, contained but two or three disconnected words; but one of those words was _Adelaide_.

“I spent an hour and a half in the yards adjoining the station before I found those two bits,” explained the young lawyer with a simple earnestness not displeasing to the two seasoned men he addressed. “One was in hiding under a stacked-up pile of outgoing freight, and the other I picked out of a cart of stuff which had been swept up in the early morning. I offer them in corroboration of Mr. Ranelagh’s statement that the ‘_Come!_’ used in the partially consumed letter found in the clubhouse chimney was addressed to Miss Carmel Cumberland and not to Adelaide, and that the place of meeting suggested by this word was the station platform, and not the spot since made terrible by death.”

“You are acquainted with Miss Carmel Cumberland’s handwriting?”

“If I am not, the town is full of people who are. I believe these words to have been written by Carmel Cumberland.”

Mr. Fox placed the pieces back in their envelope and laid the whole carefully away.

“For a second time we are obliged to you,” said he.

“You can cancel the obligation,” was the quick retort, “by discovering the identity of the man who in derby hat and a coat with a very high collar, left the grounds of The Whispering Pines just as Mr. Ranelagh drove into them. I have no facilities for the job, and no desire to undertake it.”

He had endeavoured to speak naturally, if not with an off-hand air; but he failed somehow--else why the quick glance of startled inquiry which Dr. Perry sent him from under his rather shaggy eyebrows.

“Well, we’ll undertake that, too,” promised the district attorney.

“I can ask no more,” returned Charles Clifton, arising to depart. “The confronting of that man with Ranelagh will cause the latter to unseal his lips. Before you have finished with my client, you will esteem him much more highly than you do now.”

The district attorney smiled at what seemed the callow enthusiasm of a youthful lawyer; but the coroner who knew his district well, looked very thoughtfully down at the table before which he sat, and failed to raise his head until the young man had vanished from the room and his place had been taken by another of very different appearance and deportment. Then he roused himself and introduced the newcomer to the prosecuting attorney as Caleb Sweetwater, of the New York police department.

Caleb Sweetwater was no beauty. He was plain-featured to the point of ugliness; so plain-featured that not even his quick, whimsical smile could make his face agreeable to one who did not know his many valuable qualities. His receding chin and far too projecting nose were not likely to create a favourable impression on one ignorant of his cheerful, modest, winsome disposition; and the district attorney, after eyeing him for a moment with ill-concealed disfavour, abruptly suggested:

“You have brought some credentials with you, I hope.”

“Here is a letter from one of the department. Mr. Gryce wrote it,” he added, with just a touch of pride.

“The letter is all right,” hastily remarked Dr. Perry on looking it over. “Mr. Sweetwater is commended to us as a man of sagacity and becoming reserve.”

“Very good. To business, then. The sooner we get to work on this new theory, the better. Mr. Sweetwater, we have some doubts if the man we have in hand is the man we really want. But first, how much do you know about this case?”

“All that’s in the papers.”

“Nothing more?”

“Very little. I’ve not been in town above an hour.”

“Are you known here?”

“I don’t think so; it’s my first visit this way.”

“Then you are as ignorant of the people as they are of you. Well, that has its disadvantages.”

“And its advantages, if you will permit me to say so, sir. I have no prejudices, no preconceived notions to struggle against. I can take persons as I find them; and if there is any deep family secret to unearth, it’s mighty fortunate for a man to have nothing stand in the way of his own instincts. No likings, I mean--no leanings this way or that, for humane or other purely unprofessional reasons.”

The eye of District Attorney Fox stole towards that of his brother official, but did not meet it. The coroner had turned his attention to the table again, and, while betraying no embarrassment, was not quite his usual self. The district attorney’s hand stole to his chin, which he softly rubbed with his lean forefinger as he again addressed Sweetwater.

“This tragedy--the most lamentable which has ever occurred in this town--is really, and without exaggeration, a tragedy in high life. The lady who was strangled by a brute’s clutch, was a woman of the highest culture and most estimable character. Her sister, who is supposed to have been the unconscious cause of the crime, is a young girl of blameless record. Of the man who was seen bending over the victim with his hands on her throat, we cannot speak so well. He has the faults and has lived the life of a social favourite. Gifted in many ways, and popular with both men and women, he has swung on his course with an easy disregard of the claims of others, which, while leaving its traces no doubt in many a humble and uncomplaining heart, did not attract notice to his inherent lack of principle, until the horrors of this tragedy lifted him into public view stripped of all his charms. He’s an egotist, of the first water; there is no getting over that. But did he strangle the woman? He says not; that he was only following some extraordinary impulse of the moment in laying his thumbs on the marks he saw on Miss Cumberland’s neck. A fantastic story--told too late, besides, for perfect credence, and not worthy of the least attention if--”

The reasons which followed are too well known to us for repetition. Sweetwater listened with snapping eyes to all that was said; and when he had been given the various clews indicating the presence of a third--and as yet unknown--party on the scene of crime, he rose excitedly to his feet and, declaring that it was a most promising case, begged permission to make his own investigations at The Whispering Pines, after which he would be quite ready to begin his search for the man in the derby hat and high coat-collar, whose love for wine was so great that he chose and carried off the two choicest bottles that the club-house contained.

“A hardy act for any man, gentleman or otherwise, who had just strangled the life out of a fine woman like that. If he exists and the whole story is not a pure fabrication of the entrapped Ranelagh, he shouldn’t be hard to find. What do you say, gentlemen? He shouldn’t be hard to find.”

“_We_ have not found him,” emphasised the district attorney, with the shortest possible glance at the coroner’s face.

“Then the field is all before me,” smiled Sweetwater. “Wish me luck, gentlemen. It’s a blind job, but that’s just in my line. A map of the town, a few general instructions, and I’m off.”

Mr. Fox turned towards the coroner, and opened his lips; but closed them again without speaking. Did Sweetwater notice this act of self-restraint? If he did, he failed to show it.

X

“I CAN HELP YOU”

A subtle knave; a finder out of occasions; That has an eye can stamp and counterfeit Advantages though true advantage never presents Itself; A devilish knave!

_Othello_.

A half hour spent with Hexford in and about the club-house, and Sweetwater was ready for the road. As he made his way through the northern gate, he cast a quick look back at the long, low building he had just left, with its tall chimneys and rows of sightless windows, half hidden, half revealed by the encroaching pines. The mystery of the place fascinated him. To his awakened imagination, there was a breathless suggestion in it--a suggestion which it was his foremost wish, just now, to understand.

And those pines--gaunt, restless, communicative! ready with their secret, if one could only interpret their language. How their heads came together as their garrulous tongues repeated the tale, which would never grow old to them until age nipped their hoary heads and laid them low in the dust, with their horror half expressed, their gruesome tale unfinished.

“Witnesses of it all,” commented the young detective as he watched the swaying boughs rising and dipping before a certain window. “They were peering into that room long before Clarke stole the glimpse which has undone the unfortunate Ranelagh. If I had their knowledge, I’d do something more than whisper.”

Thus musing, thus muttering, he plodded up the road, his insignificant figure an unpromising break in the monotonous white of the wintry landscape. But could the prisoner who had indirectly speeded this young detective on his present course, have read his thoughts and rightly estimated the force of his purpose, would he have viewed with so much confidence the entrance of this unprepossessing stranger upon the no-thoroughfare into which his own carefully studied admissions had blindly sent him?

As has been said before, this road was an outlying one and but little travelled save in the height of summer. Under ordinary circumstances Sweetwater would have met not more than a half-dozen carts or sledges between the club-house gates and the city streets. But to-day, the road was full of teams carrying all sorts of incongruous people, eager for a sight of the spot made forever notorious by a mysterious crime. He noted them all; the faces of the men, the gestures of the women; but he did not show any special interest till he came to that portion of the road where the long line of half-buried fences began to give way to a few scattered houses. Then his spirit woke, and he became quick, alert, and persuasive. He entered houses; he talked with the people. Though evidently not a dissipated man, he stopped at several saloons, taking his time with his glass and encouraging the chatter of all who chose to meet his advances. He was a natural talker and welcomed every topic, but his eye only sparkled at one. This he never introduced himself; he did not need to. Some one was always ready with the great theme; and once it was started, he did not let the conversation languish till every one present had given his or her quota of hearsay or opinion to the general fund.

It seemed a great waste of time, for nobody had anything to say worth the breath expended on it. But Sweetwater showed no impatience, and proceeded to engage the attention of the next man, woman, or child he encountered with undiminished zest and hopefulness.

He had left the country road behind, and had entered upon the jumble of sheds, shops, and streets which marked the beginnings of the town in this direction, when his quick and experienced eye fell on a woman standing with uncovered head in an open doorway, peering up the street in anxious expectation of some one not yet in sight. He liked the air and well-kept appearance of the woman; he appreciated the neatness of the house at her back and gauged at its proper value the interest she displayed in the expected arrival of one whom he hoped would delay that arrival long enough for him to get in the word which by this time dropped almost unconsciously from his lips.

But a second survey of the woman’s face convinced him that his ordinary loquaciousness would not serve him here. There was a refinement in her aspect quite out of keeping with the locality in which she lived, and he was hesitating how to proceed, when fortune favoured him by driving against his knees a small lad on an ill-directed sled, bringing him almost to the ground and upsetting the child who began to scream vociferously.

It was the woman’s child, for she made instantly for the gate which, for some reason, she found difficulty in opening. Sweetwater, seeing this, blessed his lucky stars. He was at his best with children, and catching the little fellow up, he soothed and fondled him and finally brought him with such a merry air of triumph straight to his mother’s arms, that confidence between them was immediately established and conversation started.

He had in his pocket an ingenious little invention which he had exhibited all along the road as an indispensable article in every well-kept house. He wanted to show it to her, but it was too cold a day for her to stop outside. Wouldn’t she allow him to step in and explain how her work could be materially lessened and her labour turned to play by a contrivance so simple that a child could run it?

It was all so ridiculous in face of this woman’s quiet intelligence, that he laughed at his own words, and this laughter, echoed by the child and in another instant by the mother, made everything so pleasant for the moment that she insensibly drew back while he pulled open the gate, only remarking, as she led the way in:

“I was looking for my husband. He may come any minute and I’m afraid he won’t care much about contrivances to save me work--that is, if they cost very much.”

Sweetwater, whose hand was in his pocket, drew it hastily out.

“You were watching for your husband? Do you often stand in the open doorway, looking for him?”

Her surprised eyes met his with a stare that would have embarrassed the most venturesome book agent, but this man was of another ilk.

“If you do,” he went on imperturbably, but with a good-humoured smile which deepened her favourable impression of him, “how much I would give if you had been standing there last Tuesday night when a certain cutter and horse went by on its way up the hill.”

She was a self-contained woman, this wife of a master mechanic in one of the great shops hard by; but her jaw fell at this, and she forgot to chide or resist her child when he began to pull her towards the open kitchen door.

Sweetwater, sensitive to the least change in the human face, prayed that the husband might be detained, if only for five minutes longer, while he, Sweetwater, worked this promising mine.

“You _were_ looking out,” he ventured. “And you _did_ see that horse and cutter. What luck! It may save a man’s life.”

“Save!” she repeated, staggering back a few steps and dragging the child with her. “Save a man’s life! What do you mean by that?”

“Not much if it was any cutter and any horse, and at any hour. But if it was the horse and cutter which left The Whispering Pines at ten or half past ten that night, then it may mean life and death to the man now in jail under the dreadful charge of murder.”

Catching up her child, she slid into the kitchen and sat down with it, in the first chair she came to. Sweetwater following her, took up his stand in the doorway, unobtrusive, but patiently waiting for her to speak. The steaming kettles and the table set for dinner gave warning of the expected presence for which she had been watching, but she seemed to have forgotten her husband; forgotten everything but her own emotions.

“Who are you?” she asked at length. “You have not told me your real business.”

“No, madam, and I ask your pardon. I feared that my real business, if suddenly made known to you, might startle, perhaps frighten you. I am a detective on the look-out for evidence in the case I have just mentioned. I have a theory that a most important witness in the same, drove by here at the hour and on the night I have named. I want to substantiate that theory. Can you help me?”

A sensitiveness to, and quick appreciation of, the character of those he addressed was one of Sweetwater’s most valuable attributes. No glossing of the truth, however skillfully applied, would have served him with this woman so well as this simple statement, followed by its equally simple and direct inquiry. Scrutinising him over the child’s head, she gave but a casual glance at the badge he took pains to show her, then in as quiet and simple tones as he had himself used, she made this reply:

“I can help you some. You make it my duty, and I have never shrunk from duty. A horse and cutter did go by here on its way uphill, last Tuesday night at about eleven o’clock. I remember the hour because I was expecting my husband every minute, just as I am now. He had some extra work on hand that night which he expected to detain him till eleven or a quarter after. Supper was to be ready at a quarter after. To surprise him I had beaten up some biscuits, and I had just put them in the pan when I heard the clock strike the hour. Afraid that he would come before they were baked, I thrust the pan into the oven and ran to the front door to look out. It was snowing very hard, and the road looked white and empty, but as I stood there a horse and cutter came in sight, which, as it reached the gate, drew up in a great hurry, as if something was the matter. Frightened, because I’m always thinking of harm to my husband whose work is very dangerous, I ran out bare-headed to the gate, when I saw why the man in the sleigh was making me such wild gestures. His hat had blown off, and was lying close up against the fence in front of me. Anxious always to oblige, I made haste to snatch at it and carry it out to its owner. I received a sort of thank you, and would never have remembered the occurrence if it had not been for that murder and if--” She paused doubtfully, ran her fingers nervously over her child’s head, looked again at Sweetwater waiting expectantly for her next word, and faltered painfully--“if I had not recognised the horse.”

Sweetwater drew a deep breath; it was such a happy climax. Then, as she showed no signs of saying more, asked as quietly as his rapidly beating heart permitted:

“Didn’t you recognise the man?”

Her answer was short but as candid as her expression.

“No. The snow was blinding; besides he wore a high collar, in which his head was sunk down almost out of sight.”

“But the horse--”

“Was one which is often driven by here. I had rather not tell you whose it is. I have not told any one, not even my husband, about seeing it on the road that night. I couldn’t somehow. But if it will save a man’s life and make clear who killed that good woman, ask any one on the Hill, in what stable you can find a grey horse with a large black spot on his left shoulder, and you will know as much about it as I do. Isn’t that enough, sir? Now, I must dish up my dinner.”

“Yes, yes; it’s almost enough. Just one question, madam. Was the hat what folks call a derby? Like this one, madam,” he explained, drawing his own from behind his back.

“Yes, I think so. As well as I can remember, it was like that. I’m afraid I didn’t do it any good by my handling. I had to clutch it quick and I’m sure I bent the brim, to say nothing of smearing it with flour-marks.”

“How?” Sweetwater had started for the door, but stopped, all eagerness at this last remark.

“I had been cutting out biscuits, and my hands were white with flour,” she explained, simply. “But that brushes off easily; I don’t suppose it mattered.”

“No, no,” he hastily assented. Then while he smiled and waved his hand to the little urchin who had been his means of introduction to this possibly invaluable witness, he made one final plea and that was for her name.

“Eliza Simmons,” was the straightforward reply; and this ended the interview.

The husband, whose anticipated approach had occasioned all this abruptness, was coming down the hill when Sweetwater left the gate. As this detective of ours was as careful in his finish as in all the rest of his work, he called out as he went by:

“I’ve just been trying to sell a wonderful contrivance of mine to the missus. But it was no go.”

The man looked, smiled, and went in at his own gate with the air of one happy in wife, child, and home.

Sweetwater went on up the hill. Towards the top, he came upon a livery-stable. Stopping in his good-humoured way, he entered into talk with a man loitering inside the great door. Before he left him, he had asked him these questions:

“Any grey horse in town?”

“Yes, _one_.”

“I think I’ve seen it--has a patch of black on its left shoulder.”

“Yes.”

“Whose is it? I’ve a mighty curiosity about the horse. Looks like a trick horse.”

“I don’t know what you mean by that. It belongs to a respectable family. A family you must have heard about if you ever heard anything. There’s a funeral there to-day--”

“Not Miss Cumberland’s?” exclaimed Sweetwater, all agog in a moment.

“Yes, Miss Cumberland’s. I thought you might have heard the name.”

“Yes, I’ve heard it.”

The tone was dry, the words abrupt, but the detective’s heart was dancing like a feather. The next turn he took was toward the handsome residence district crowning the hill.

XI

IN THE COACH HOUSE

All things that we ordained festival Turn from their office to black funeral; Our instruments to melancholy bells; Our wedding cheer to a sad burial feast; And all things change them to the contrary.

_Romeo and Juliet_.

Fifteen minutes later, he stood in a finely wooded street before an open gateway guarded by a policeman. Showing his badge, he passed in, and entered a long and slightly curved driveway. As he did so, he took a glance at the house. It was not as pretentious as he expected, but infinitely more inviting. Low and rambling, covered with vines, and nestling amid shrubbery which even in winter gave it a habitable air, it looked as much the abode of comfort as of luxury, and gave--in outward appearance at least--no hint of the dark shadow which had so lately fallen across it.

The ceremonies had been set for three o’clock, and it was now half past two. As Sweetwater reached the head of the driveway, he saw the first of a long file of carriages approaching up the street.

“Lucky that my business takes me to the stable,” thought he. “What is the coachman’s name? I ought to remember it. Ah--Zadok! Zadok Brown. There’s a combination for you!”

He had reached this point in his soliloquy (a bad habit of his, for it sometimes took audible expression) when he ran against another policeman set to guard the side door. A moment’s parley, and he left this man behind; but not before he had noted this door and the wide and hospitable verandah which separated it from the driveway.

“I am willing to go all odds that I shall find that verandah the most interesting part of the house,” he remarked, in quiet conviction, to himself, as he noted its nearness to the stable and the ease with which one could step from it into a vehicle passing down the driveway.

It had another point of interest, or, rather the wing had to which it was attached. As his eye travelled back across this wing, in his lively walk towards the stable, he caught a passing glimpse of a nurse’s face and figure in one of its upper windows. This located the sick chamber, and unconsciously he hushed his step and moved with the greatest caution, though he knew that this sickness was not one of the nerves, and that the loudest sound would fail to reach ears lapsed in a blessed, if alarming, unconsciousness.

Once around the corner, he resumed a more natural pace, and perceiving that the stable-door was closed but that a window well up the garden side was open, he cast a look towards the kitchen windows at his back, and, encountering no watchful eye, stepped up to the former one and peered in.

A man sat with his back to him, polishing a bit of harness. This was probably Zadok, the coachman. As his interest was less with him than with the stalls beyond, he let his eye travel on in their direction, when he suddenly experienced a momentary confusion by observing the head and shoulders of Hexford leaning towards him from an opposite window--in much the same fashion, and certainly with exactly the same intent, as himself. As their glances crossed, both flushed and drew back, only to return again, each to his several peep-hole. Neither meant to lose the advantage of the moment. Both had heard of the grey horse and wished to identify it; Hexford for his own satisfaction, Sweetwater as the first link of the chain leading him into the mysterious course mapped out for him by fate. That each was more or less under the surveillance of the other did not trouble either.

There were three stalls, and in each stall a horse stamped and fidgeted. Only one held their attention. This was a mare on the extreme left, a large grey animal with a curious black patch on its near shoulder. The faces of both men changed as they recognised this distinguishing mark, and instinctively their eyes met across the width of the open space separating them. Hexford’s finger rose to his mouth, but Sweetwater needed no such hint. He stood, silent as his own shadow, while the coachman rubbed away with less and less purpose, until his hands stood quite still and his whole figure drooped in irresistible despondency. As he raised his face, moved perhaps by that sense of a watchful presence to which all of us are more or less susceptible, they were both surprised to see tears on it. The next instant he had started to his feet and the bit of harness had rattled from his hands to the floor.

“Who are you?” he asked, with a touch of anger, quite natural under the circumstances. “Can’t you come in by the door, and not creep sneaking up to take a man at disadvantage?”

As he spoke, he dashed away the tears with which his cheeks were still wet.

“I thought a heap of my young mistress,” he added, in evident apology for this display of what such men call weakness. “I didn’t know that it was in me to cry for anything, but I find that I can cry for her.”

Hexford left his window, and Sweetwater slid from his; next minute they met at the stable door.

“Had luck?” whispered the local officer.

“Enough to bring me here,” acknowledged the other.

“Do you mean to this house or to this stable?”

“To this stable.”

“Have you heard that the horse was out that night?”

“Yes, she was out.”

“Who driving?”

“Ah, that’s the question!”

“This man can’t tell you.”

A jerk of Hexford’s thumb in Zadok’s direction emphasised this statement.

“But I’m going to talk to him, for all that.”

“He wasn’t here that night; he was at a dance. He only knows that the mare was out.”

“But I’m going to talk to him.”

“May I come in, too? I’ll not interrupt. I’ve just fifteen minutes to spare.”

“You can do as you please. I’ve nothing to hide--from you, at any rate.”

Which wasn’t quite true; but Sweetwater wasn’t a stickler for truth, except in the statements he gave his superiors.

Hexford threw open the stable-door, and they both walked in. The coachman was not visible, but they could hear him moving about above, grumbling to himself in none too encouraging a way.

Evidently he was in no mood for visitors.

“I’ll be down in a minute,” he called out, as their steps sounded on the hardwood floor.

Hexford sauntered over to the stalls. Sweetwater stopped near the doorway and glanced very carefully about him. Nothing seemed to escape his eye. He even took the trouble to peer into a waste-bin, and was just on the point of lifting down a bit of broken bottle from an open cupboard when Brown appeared on the staircase, dressed in his Sunday coat and carrying a bunch of fresh, hot-house roses.

He stopped midway as Sweetwater turned towards him from the cupboard, but immediately resumed his descent and was ready with his reply when Hexford accosted him from the other end of the stable:

“An odd beast, this. They don’t drive her for her beauty, that’s evident.”

“She’s fast and she’s knowing,” grumbled the coachman. “Reason enough for overlooking her spots. Who’s that man?” he grunted, with a drop of his lantern jaws, and a slight gesture towards the unknown interloper.

“Another of us,” replied Hexford, with a shrug. “We’re both rather interested in this horse.”

“Wouldn’t another time do?” pleaded the coachman, looking gravely down at the flowers he held. “It’s most time for the funeral and I don’t feel like talking, indeed I don’t, gentlemen.”

“We won’t keep you.” It was Sweetwater who spoke. “The mare’s company enough for us. She knows a lot, this mare. I can see it in her eye. I understand horses; we’ll have a little chat, she and I, when you are gone.”

Brown cast an uneasy glance at Hexford.

“He’d better not touch her,” he cautioned. “He don’t know the beast well enough for that.”

“He won’t touch her,” Hexford assured him. “She does look knowing, don’t she? Would like to tell us something, perhaps. Was out _that_ night, I’ve heard you say. Curious! How did you know it?”

“I’ve said and said till I’m tired,” Brown answered, with sudden heat. “This is pestering a man at a very unfortunate time. Look! the people are coming. I must go. My poor mistress! and poor Miss Carmel! I liked ’em, do ye understand? Liked ’em--and I do feel the trouble at the house, I do.”

His distress was so genuine that Hexford was inclined to let him go; but Sweetwater with a cock of his keen eye put in his word and held the coachman where he was.

“The old gal is telling me all about it,” muttered this sly, adaptable fellow. He had sidled up to the mare and their heads were certainly very close together. “Not touch her? See here!” Sweetwater had his arm round the filly’s neck and was looking straight into her fiery and intelligent eye. “Shall I pass her story on?” he asked, with a magnetic smile at the astonished coachman, which not only softened him but seemed to give the watchful Hexford quite a new idea of this gawky interloper.

“You’ll oblige _me_ if you can put her knowledge into words,” the man Zadok declared, with one fascinated eye on the horse and the other on the house where he evidently felt that his presence was wanted. “She was out that night, and I know it, as any coachman would know, who doesn’t come home stone drunk. But where she was and who took her, get her to tell if you can, for I don’t know no more ’n the dead.”

“The dead!” flashed out Sweetwater, wheeling suddenly about and pointing straight through the open stable-door towards the house where the young mistress the old servant mourned, lay in her funeral casket. “Do you mean her--the lady who is about to be buried? Could _she_ tell if her lips were not sealed by a murderer’s hand?”

“She!” The word came low and awesomely. Rude and uncultured as the man was, he seemed to be strangely affected by this unexpected suggestion. “I haven’t the wit to answer that,” said he. “How can we tell what she knew. The man who killed her is in jail. _He_ might talk to some purpose. Why don’t you question him?”

“For a very good reason,” replied Sweetwater, with an easy good-nature that was very reassuring. “He was arrested on the spot; so that it wasn’t he who drove this mare home, unharnessed her, put her back in her stall, locked the stable-door and hung up the key in its place in the kitchen. Somebody else did _that_.”

“That’s true enough, and what does it show? That the mare was out on some other errand than the one which ended in blood and murder,” was the coachman’s unexpected retort.

“Is that so?” whispered Sweetwater into the mare’s cocked ear. “She’s not quite ready to commit herself,” he drawled, with another enigmatical smile at the lingering Zadok. “She’s keeping something back. Are you?” he pointedly inquired, leaving the stalls and walking briskly up to Zadok.

The coachman frowned and hastily retreated a step; but in another moment he leaped in a rage upon Sweetwater, when the sight of the flowers he held recalled him to himself and he let his hand fall again with the quiet remark:

“You’re overstepping your dooty. I don’t know who you are or what you want with me, but you’re overstepping your dooty.”

“He’s right,” muttered Hexford. “Better let the fellow go. See! one of the maids is beckoning to him.”

“He shall go, and welcome, if he will tell me where he gets his taste for this especial brand of whiskey.” Sweetwater had crossed to the cupboard and taken down the lower half of the broken bottle which had attracted his notice on his first entrance, and was now holding it out, with a quizzical look at the departing coachman.

Hexford was at his shoulder with a spring, and together they inspected the label still sticking to it--which was that of the very rare and expensive spirit found missing from the club-house vault.

“This is a find,” muttered Hexford into his fellow detective’s ear. Then, with a quick move towards Zadok, he shouted out:

“You’d better answer that question. Where did this bit of broken bottle come from? They don’t give you whiskey like this to drink.”

“That they don’t,” muttered the coachman, not so much abashed as they had expected. “And I wouldn’t care for it if they did. I found that bit of bottle in the ash-barrel outside, and fished it out to put varnish in. I liked the shape.”

“Broken this way?”

“Yes; it’s just as good.”

“Is it? Well, never mind, run along. We’ll close the stable-door for you.”

“I’d rather do it myself and carry in the key.”

“Here then; we’re going to the funeral, too. You’d like to?” This latter in a whisper to Sweetwater.

The answer was a fervent one. Nothing in all the world would please this protean-natured man quite so well.

XII

“LILA--LILA!”

O, treble woe Fall ten times treble on that cursed head, Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense Depriv’d thee of!--Hold off the earth awhile, Till I have caught her once more in my arms.

_Hamlet_.

“Let us enter by the side door,” suggested Sweetwater, as the two moved towards the house. “And be sure you place me where I can see without being seen. I have no wish to attract attention to myself, or to be identified with the police until the necessity is forced upon me.”

“Then we won’t go in together,” decided Hexford. “Find your own place; you won’t have any difficulty. A crowd isn’t expected. Miss Cumberland’s condition forbids it.”

Sweetwater nodded and slid in at the side door.

He found himself at once in a narrow hall, from the end of which opened a large room. A few people were to be seen in this latter place, and his first instinct was to join them; but finding that a few minutes yet remained before the hour set for the services, he decided to improve them by a rapid glance about this hall, which, for certain reasons hardly as yet formulated in his own mind, had a peculiar interest for him.

The most important object within view, according to his present judgment, was the staircase which connected it with the floor above; but if you had asked his reason for this conclusion, he would not have told you, as Ranelagh might have done, that it was because it was the most direct and convenient approach to Carmel Cumberland’s room. His thoughts were far from this young girl, intimately connected as she was with this crime; which shows through what a blind maze he was insensibly working. With his finger on the thread which had been put in his hand, he was feeling his way along inch by inch. It had brought him to this staircase, and it led him next to a rack upon which hung several coats and a gentleman’s hat.

He inspected the former and noted that one was finished with a high collar; but he passed the latter by--it was not a derby. The table stood next the rack, and on its top lay nothing more interesting than a clothes-brush and one or two other insignificant objects; but, with his memory for details, he had recalled the keys which one of the maids had picked up somewhere about this house, and laid on a hall table. If this were the hall and this the table, then was every inch of the latter’s simple cloth-covered top of the greatest importance in his eyes.

He had no further time for even these cursory investigations; Hexford’s step could be heard on the verandah, and Sweetwater was anxious to locate himself before the officer came in. Entering the room before him, he crossed to the small group clustered in its further doorway. There were several empty chairs in sight; but he passed around them all to a dark and inconspicuous corner, from which, without effort, he could take in every room on that floor--from the large parlour in which the casket stood, to the remotest region of the servants’ hall.

The clergyman had not yet descended, and Sweetwater had time to observe the row of little girls sitting in front of the bearers, each with a small cluster of white flowers in her hand. Miss Cumberland’s Sunday-school class, he conjectured, and conjectured rightly. He also perceived that some of these children loved her.

Near them sat a few relatives and friends. Among these was a very, very old man, whom he afterwards heard was a great-uncle and a centenarian. Between him and one of the little girls, there apparently existed a strong sympathy; for his hand reached out and drew her to him when the tears began to steal down her cheeks, and the looks which passed between the two had all the appeal and all the protection of a great love.

Sweetwater, who had many a soft spot in his breast, felt his heart warm at this one innocent display of natural feeling in an assemblage otherwise frozen by the horror of the occasion. His eyes dwelt lingeringly on the child, and still more lingeringly on the old, old man, before passing to that heaped-up mound of flowers, under which lay a murdered body and a bruised heart. He could not see the face, but the spectacle was sufficiently awe-compelling without that.

Would it have seemed yet more so, had he known at whose request the huge bunch of lilies had been placed over that silent heart?

The sister sick, the brother invisible, there was little more to hold his attention in this quarter; so he let it roam across the heads of the people about him, to the distant hall communicating with the kitchen.

Several persons were approaching from this direction, among them Zadok. The servants of the house, no doubt, for they came in all together and sat down, side by side, in the chairs Sweetwater had so carefully passed by. There were five persons in all: two men and three women. Only two interested him--Zadok, with whom he had already made a superficial acquaintance and had had one bout; and a smart, bright-eyed girl with a resolute mouth softened by an insistent dimple, who struck him as possessing excellent sense and some natural cleverness. A girl to know and a girl to talk to, was his instantaneous judgment. Then he forgot everything but the solemnity of the occasion, for the clergyman had entered and taken his place, and a great hush had fallen upon the rooms and upon every heart there present.

“_I am the resurrection and the life_.”

Never had these consoling words sounded more solemn than when they rang above the remains of Adelaide Cumberland, in this home where she had reigned as mistress ever since her seventeenth year. The nature of the tragedy which had robbed the town of one of its most useful young women; the awful fate impending over its supposed author,--a man who had come and gone in these rooms with a spell of fascination to which many of those present had themselves succumbed--the brooding sense of illness, if not of impending death, in the room above; gave to these services a peculiar poignancy which in some breasts of greater susceptibility than the rest, took the form of a vague expectancy bordering on terror.

Sweetwater felt the poignancy, but did not suffer from the terror. His attention had been attracted in a new direction, and he found himself watching, with anxious curiosity, the attitude and absorbed expression of a good-looking young man whom he was far from suspecting to be the secret representative of the present suspect, whom nobody could forget, yet whom nobody wished to remember at this hallowed hour.