The jacques futrelle meg.., p.112
The Jacques Futrelle Megapack, page 112
“It’s my man, all right,” he assured the chief. “He has been missing since Friday night, and no one knows his whereabouts. It’s my man.”
It was an hour’s ride to Coaldale, a sprawling, straggly village with only four or five houses in sight from the station. When the three men left the train there, Mr. Birnes walked over and spoke to the agent, a thin, cadaverous, tobacco-chewing specimen of his species.
“We are looking for an old gentleman who lives out here somewhere,” he explained. “He probably lives alone, and we’ve been told that he has a little cottage somewhere over this way.”
He waved his hand vaguely to the right, in accordance with the directions of Red Haney. The station agent scratched his stubbly chin, and spat with great accuracy through a knot-hole ten feet away.
“’Spect you mean old man Kellner,” he replied obligingly. “He lives by hisself part of the time; then again sometimes his grand-darter lives with him.”
Granddaughter! Mr. Birnes almost jumped.
“A granddaughter, yes,” he said with a forced calm. “Rather a pretty girl, twenty-two or three years old? Sometimes she dresses in blue?”
“Yes,” the agent agreed. “’Spect them’s them. Follow the road there till you come to Widow Gardiner’s hog-lot, then turn to your left, and it’s about a quarter of a mile on. The only house up that way—you can’t miss it.”
The agent stood squinting at them, with friendly inquiry radiating from his parchment-like countenance, and Mr. Birnes took an opportunity to ask some other questions.
“By the way, what sort of old man is this Mr. Kellner? What does he do? Is he wealthy?”
A pleasant grin overspread his informant’s face; one finger was raised to his head and twirled significantly.
“’Spect he’s crazy,” he went on to explain. “Don’t do nothing, so far as nobody knows—lives like a hermit, stays in the house all the time, and has long whiskers. Don’t know whether he’s rich or not, but ’spect he ain’t becuz no man with money’d live like he does.” He thrust a long forefinger into Mr. Birnes’ face. “And stingy! He’s so stingy he won’t let nobody come in the house—scared they’ll wear the furniture out looking at it.”
“How long has he lived here?”
“There ain’t nobody in this town old enough to say. Why, mister, I’ll bet that old man’s a thousand years old. Wait’ll you see him.”
That was all. They went on as indicated.
“The very type of man who would scrimp and starve to put all his money in something like diamonds,” mused Chief Arkwright. “The usual rich old miser who winds up by being murdered.”
They passed the “Widow Gardiner’s hog-lot” and came into a pleasant country road, which, turning, brought them to a shabby little cottage, embowered in trees. Through the foliage, farther on, they caught the amber gleam of a languid river; and around their feet, as they entered the yard, scores of pigeons fluttered.
“Carriers!” ejaculated Mr. Birnes, as if startled.
With a strange feeling of elation the detective led the way up the steps to the veranda and knocked. There was no answer. He glanced at the chief significantly, and tried the door. It was locked.
“Try the back door,” directed Chief Arkwright tersely. “If that’s locked we’ll go in anyway.”
They passed around the house to the rear, and Mr. Birnes laid one hand upon the door-knob. He turned it and the door swung inward. Again he glanced at Chief Arkwright. The chief nodded, and led the way into the house. They stood in a kitchen, clean as to floors and tables, but now in the utmost disorder. They spent only a moment here, then passed into the narrow hall, along this to a door that stood open, and then—then Chief Arkwright paused, staring downward, and respectfully lifted his hat.
“Always the same,” he remarked enigmatically.
Mr. Birnes thrust himself forward and through the door. On the floor, with white face turned upward, and fixed, staring eyes, lay an old man. His venerable gray hair, long and unkempt, fell back from a brow of noble proportions, the wide, high brow of the student; and a great, snow-white beard rippled down over his breast. Save for the glassiness of the eyes the face was placid in death, even as it must have been in life.
Mutely Mr. Birnes examined the body. A blow in the back of the head—that was all. Then he glanced around the room inquiringly. Everything was in order, except—except here lay an overturned cigar-box. He picked it up; two uncut diamonds were on the floor beneath it. The rough, inert pebbles silently attested the obvious manner of death which simultaneously forced itself upon the three men—the cowardly blow of an assassin, a dying struggle, perhaps, for the contents of the box, and this—the end!
From outside came sharply in the silence the rattle of wheels on the gravel of the road, and a vehicle stopped in front of the door.
“Sh-h-h-h!” warned the chief.
Some one came along the walk, up the steps and rapped briskly on the door; the detectives waited motionless, silent The knob rattled under impatient fingers, then the footsteps passed along the veranda quickly, and were lost, as if some one had stepped off at the end intending to come to the back door, which was open. A moment later they heard steps in the kitchen, then in the narrow hall approaching, and the doorway of the room where they stood framed the figure of a man. It was Mr. Czenki.
“There’s your man, Chief,” remarked Mr. Birnes quietly.
The diamond expert permitted his gaze to wander from one to another of the three men, and then the beady black eyes came to rest on the silent, outstretched figure of the old man. He started forward impulsively; the grip of Detective-Sergeant Connelly on his arm stopped him.
“You’re my prisoner!”
“Yes, I understand,” said Mr. Czenki impatiently. He didn’t even look up; he was still gazing at the figure on the floor.
“Well, what have you got to say for yourself?” demanded Chief Arkwright coldly.
Mr. Czenki met the accusing stare of the chief squarely for an instant, then the keen eyes shifted to the slightly flushed face of Mr. Birnes and lingered there interrogatively.
“I have nothing whatever to say,” he replied at last, and he drew one hand slowly across his thin, scarred face. “Yes, I understand,” he repeated absently. “I have nothing to say.”
CHAPTER XIV
CAUGHT IN THE NET
Doris looked down in great, dry-eyed horror upon the body of this withered old man whom she had loved, and the thin thread of life within her all but snapped. It had come; the premonition of disaster had been fulfilled; the last of her blood had been sacrificed to the mercilessly glittering diamonds—father, brother and now him! Mr. Wynne’s face went white, and his teeth closed fiercely; he had loved this old man, too; then the shock passed and he turned anxiously to Doris to receive the limp, inert figure in his arms. She had fainted.
“Well, what do you know about it?” inquired Chief Arkwright abruptly.
Mr. Wynne was himself again instantly—the calm, self-certain perfectly poised young man of affairs. He glanced at the chief, then shot a quick, inquiring look at Mr. Czenki. Almost imperceptibly the diamond expert shook his head. Then Mr. Wynne’s eyes turned upon Mr. Birnes. There had been triumph in the detective’s face until that moment, but, under the steady, meaning glare which was directed at him, triumph faded to a sort of wonder, followed by a vague sense of uneasiness, and he read a command in the fixed eyes—a command to silence. Curiously enough it reminded him that he was in the employ of Mr. Latham, and that there were certain business secrets to be protected. He regarded the coroner’s physician, hastily summoned for a perfunctory examination.
“Well?” demanded the chief again.
“Nothing—of this,” replied Mr. Wynne. “I think, Doctor,” and he addressed the physician, “that she needs you more than he does. We know only too well what’s the matter with him.”
The physician arose obediently. Mr. Wynne gathered up the slender, still figure in his arms, and bore it away to another room. The doctor bent over Doris, and tested the fluttering heart.
“Only shock,” he said finally, when he looked up. “She’ll come round all right in a little while.”
“Thank God!” the young man breathed softly.
He stooped and pressed reverent lips to the marble-white brow, then straightened up and, after one long, lingering look at her, turned quickly and left the room.
“I have no statement to make,” Mr. Czenki was saying, in that level, unemotional way of his, when Mr. Wynne reentered the room where lay the dead.
“We are to assume that you are guilty, then?” demanded Chief Arkwright with cold finality.
“I have nothing to say,” replied the expert. His gaze met that of Mr. Wynne for a moment, then settled on the venerable face of the old man.
“Guilty?” interposed Mr. Wynne quickly. “Guilty of what?”
Chief Arkwright, without speaking, waved his hand toward the body on the floor. There was a flash of amazement in the young man’s face, a sudden bewilderment; the diamond expert’s countenance was expressionless.
“You don’t deny that you killed him?” persisted the chief accusingly.
“I have nothing to say,” said the expert again.
“And you don’t deny that you were Red Haney’s accomplice?”
“I have nothing to say,” was the monotonous answer.
The chief shrugged his shoulders impatiently. Some illuminating thought shone for an instant in Mr. Wynne’s clear eyes and he nodded as if a question in his mind had been answered.
“Perhaps, Chief, there may be some mistake?” he protested half-heartedly. “Perhaps this gentleman—what motive would—”
“There’s motive enough,” interrupted the chief briskly. “We have this man’s description straight from his accomplice, Red Haney, even to the scar on his face—” He paused abruptly, and regarded Mr. Wynne through half-closed lids. “By the way,” he continued deliberately, “who are you? What do you know about it?”
“My name is Wynne—E. van Cortlandt Wynne” was the ready response. “I am directly interested in this case through a long-standing friendship for Mr. Kellner here, and through the additional fact that his granddaughter in the adjoining room is soon to become my wife.” There was a little pause. “I may add that I live in New York, and that Miss Kellner has been stopping there for several days. She has been accustomed to hearing from her grandfather at least once a day by telephone, but she was unable to get an answer either yesterday or to-day, so she came to my home, and together we came out here.”
Mr. Birnes looked up quickly. It had suddenly occurred to him to wonder as to the whereabouts of Claflin and Sutton, who had been on watch at the Thirty-seventh Street house. The young man interpreted the expression of his face aright, and favored him with a meaning glance.
“We came alone,” he supplemented.
Mr. Birnes silently pondered it.
“All that being true,” Chief Arkwright suggested tentatively, “perhaps you can give us some information as to the diamonds that were stolen? How much were they worth? How many were there?” He held up the uncut stones that had been found on the floor.
“I don’t know their exact number,” was the reply. “Their value, I should say, was about sixty thousand dollars. Except for this little house, and the grounds adjoining, practically all of Mr. Kellner’s money was invested in diamonds. Those you have there are part of an accumulation of many years, imported in the rough, one or two at a time.”
Mr. Czenki was gazing abstractedly out of a window, but the expression on his lean face indicated the keenest interest, and—and something else; apprehension, maybe. The chief stared straight into the young man’s eyes for an instant, and then:
“And Mr. Kellner’s family?” he inquired.
“There is no one, except his granddaughter, Doris.”
Some change, sudden as it was pronounced, came over the chief, and his whole attitude altered. He dropped into a chair near the door.
“Have a seat, Mr. Wynne,” he invited courteously, “and let’s understand this thing clearly. Over there, please,” and he indicated a chair partly facing that in which Mr. Czenki sat.
Mr. Wynne sat down.
“Now you don’t seem to believe,” the chief went on pleasantly, “that Czenki here killed Mr. Kellner?”
“Well, no,” the young man admitted.
Mr. Czenki glanced at him quickly, warningly. The chief was not looking, but he knew the glance had passed.
“And why don’t you believe it?” he continued.
“In the first place,” Mr. Wynne began without hesitation, “the diamonds were worth only about sixty thousand dollars, and Mr. Czenki here draws a salary of twenty-five thousand dollars a year. The proportion is wrong, you see. Again, Mr. Czenki is a man of unquestioned integrity. As diamond expert of the Henry Latham Company he handles millions of dollars’ worth of precious stones each year, and has practically unlimited opportunities for theft, without murder, if he were seeking to steal. He has been with that company for several years, and that fact alone is certainly to his credit.”
“Very good,” commented the chief ambiguously. He paused an instant to study this little man with an interest aroused by the sum of his salary. “And what of Haney’s description? His accusation?” he asked.
“Haney might have lied, you know,” retorted Mr. Wynne. “Men in his position have been known to lie.”
“I understood you to say,” the chief resumed, heedless of the note of irony in the other’s voice, “that you and Miss Kellner are to be married?”
“Yes.”
“And that she is the only heir of her grandfather?”
“Yes.”
“Therefore, at his death, the diamonds would become her property?”
For one instant Mr. Wynne seemed startled, and turned his clear eyes full upon his interrogator, seeking the hidden meaning.
“Yes, but—” he began slowly.
“That’s true, isn’t it?” demanded the chief, with quick violence.
“Yes, that’s true,” Mr. Wynne admitted calmly.
“Therefore, indirectly, it would have been to your advantage if Mr. Kellner had died or had been killed?”
“In that the diamonds would have come to my intended wife, yes,” was the reply.
Mr. Czenki clasped and unclasped his thin hands nervously. His face was again expressionless, and the beady eyes were fastened immovably on Chief Arkwright’s. Mr. Birnes was frankly amazed at this unexpected turn of the affair. Suddenly Chief Arkwright brought his hand down on the arm of his chair with a bang.
“Suppose, for the moment, that Red Haney lied, and that Mr. Czenki is not the murderer, then—As a matter of fact your salary isn’t twenty-five thousand a year, is it?”
He was on his feet now, with blazing eyes, and one hand was thrust accusingly into Mr. Wynne’s face. It was simulation; Mr. Birnes understood it; a police method of exhausting possibilities. There was not the slightest movement by Mr. Wynne to indicate uneasiness at the charge, not a tremor in his voice when he spoke again.
“I understand perfectly, Chief,” he remarked coldly. “Just what was the time of the crime, may I ask?”
“Answer my question,” insisted the Chief thunderously.
“Now look here, Chief,” Mr. Wynne went on frigidly, “I am not a child to be frightened into making any absurd statements. I do not draw a salary of twenty-five thousand a year, no. I am in business for myself, and make more than that. You may satisfy yourself by examining the books in my office if you like. By intimation, at least, you are accusing me of murder. Now answer me a question, please. What was the time of the crime?”
CHAPTER XV
THE TRUTH IN PART
The chief dropped back into his chair with the utmost complacency. This was not the kind of man with whom mere bluster counted.
“Haney says Saturday morning,” he answered. “The coroner’s physician agrees with that.”
“Yesterday morning,” Mr. Wynne mused; then, after a moment: “I think, Chief, you know Mr. Birnes here? And that you would accept a statement of his as correct?”
“Yes,” the chief agreed with a glance at Mr. Birnes.
“Mr. Birnes, where was I all day Saturday?” Mr. Wynne queried, without so much as looking around at him.
“You were in your house from eleven o’clock Friday night until fifteen minutes of nine o’clock Saturday morning,” was the response. “You left there at that time, and took the surface car at Thirty-fourth Street to your office. You left your office at five minutes of one, took luncheon alone at the Savarin, and returned to your office at two o’clock. You remained there until five, or a few minutes past, then returned home. At eight you—”
“Is that sufficient?” interrupted Mr. Wynne. “Does that constitute an alibi?”
“Yes,” he admitted; “but how do you know all this, Birnes?”
“Mr. Birnes and the men of his agency have favored me with the most persistent attentions during the last few days,” Mr. Wynne continued promptly. “He has had two men constantly on watch at my office, day and night, and two others constantly on watch at my home, day and night. There are two there now—one in a rear room of the basement, and another in the pantry, with the doors locked on the outside. Their names are Claflin and Sutton!”
So, that was it! It came home to Mr. Birnes suddenly. Claflin and Sutton had been tricked into the house on some pretext, and locked in! Confound their stupidity!
“Why are they locked up?” demanded the chief, with kindling interest. “Why have you been watched?”
“I think, perhaps, Mr. Birnes will agree with me when I say that that has nothing whatever to do with this crime,” replied Mr. Wynne easily.
“That’s for me to decide,” declared the chief bluntly.
There was a long pause. Mr. Czenki was leaning forward in his chair, gripping the arms fiercely, with his lips pressed into a thin line. It was only by a supreme effort that he held himself in control; and the lean, scarred face was working strangely.
