The Red Dress
“Another morning; and nothing! Three days gone and no word, no sign
from her; or any mark of weakening!”
The powerful man at the window clenched his hands. Then he swung about
to face his confidential secretary and stared at her uncertainly. It
was the tenth time that morning, and the fiftieth time in the three
days just gone, that Walter Eldredge, the young president of the great
Chicago drygoods house of Eldredge and Company, had paused, incapable
of continuing business.
“Never mind that letter, Miss Webster,” he commanded. “But tell me
again—are you sure that no one has come to see me, and there has been
no message, about my wife—I mean about Edward—about Edward?”
“No; no one, I am sure, Mr. Eldredge!”
“Send Mr. Murray to me!” he said.
“Raymond, something more effective must be done!” he cried, as his
brother-in-law appeared in the doorway. “It is impossible for matters
to remain longer in this condition!” His face grew gray. “I am going
to put it into the hands of the police!”
“The police!” cried Murray. “After the way the papers treated you and
Isabel when you married? You and Isabel in the papers again, and the
police making it a public scandal! Surely there’s still some private
way! Why not this fellow Trant. You must have followed in the papers
the way he got immediate action in the Bronson murder mystery, after
the police force was at fault for two weeks. He’s our man for this
sort of thing, Walter! Where can we get his address?”
“Try the University Club,” said Eldredge.
Murray lifted the desk phone. “He’s a member; he’s there. What shall I
tell him,” Eldredge himself took up the conversation.
“Yes! Mr. Trant? Mr. Trant, this is Walter Eldredge, of Eldredge and
Company. Yes; there is a private matter—something has happened in my
family; I cannot tell you over the phone. If you could come to me
here. . . . Yes! It is criminal.” His voice broke. “For God’s sake
come and help me!”
Ten minutes later a boy showed Trant into the young president’s
private room. If the psychologist had never seen Walter Eldredge’s
portrait in the papers he could have seen at a glance that he was a
man trained to concentrate his attention on large matters; and he as
quickly recognized that the pale, high-bred, but weak features of
Eldredge’s companion belonged to a dependent, subordinate to the
other.
Eldredge had sprung nervously to his feet and Trant was conscious that
he was estimating him with the acuteness of one accustomed to judge
another quickly and to act upon his judgment. Yet it was Murray who
spoke first.
“Mr. Eldredge wished to apply to the police this morning, Mr. Trant,”
he explained, patronizingly, “in a matter of the most delicate nature;
but I—I am Raymond Murray, Mr. Eldredge’s brother-in-law—persuaded him
to send for you. I did this, trusting quite as much to your delicacy
in guarding Mr. Eldredge from public scandal as to your ability to
help us directly. We understand that you are not a regular private
detective.”
“I am a psychologist, Mr. Eldredge,” Trant replied to the older man,
stifling his irritation at Murray’s manner. “I have merely made some
practical applications of simple psychological experiments, which
should have been put into police procedure years ago. Whether I am
able to assist you or not, you may be sure that I will keep your
confidence.”
“Then this is the case, Trant.” Murray came to the point quickly. “My
nephew, Edward Eldredge, Walter’s older son, was kidnaped three days
ago.”
“What?” Trant turned from one to the other in evident astonishment.
“Since the Whitman case in Ohio,” continued Murray, “and the Bradley
kidnaping in St. Louis last week—where they got the description of the
woman but have caught no one yet—the papers predicted an epidemic of
child stealing. And it has begun in Chicago with the stealing of
Walter’s son!”
“That didn’t surprise me—that the boy may be missing,” Trant rejoined.
“But it surprised me, Mr. Eldredge, that no one has heard of it! Why
did you not at once give it the greatest publicity? Why have you not
called in the police? What made you wait three days before calling in
even me?”
“Because the family,” Murray replied, “have known from the first that
it was Mrs. Eldredge who had the child abducted.”
“_Mrs. Eldredge?_” Trant cried incredulously. “Your wife, sir?” he
appealed to the older man.
“Yes, Mr. Trant,” Eldredge answered, miserably.
“Then why have you sent for me at all?”
“Because in three days we have gained nothing from her,” the
brother-in-law replied before Eldredge could answer. “And, from the
accounts of your ability, we thought you could, in some way, learn
from her where the child is concealed.”
The young president of Eldredge and Company was twisting under the
torture of these preliminaries. But Trant turned curiously to Murray.
“Mrs. Eldredge is not your sister?”
“No; not the present Mrs. Eldredge. My sister, Walter’s first wife,
died six years ago, when Edward was born. She gave her life for the
boy whom the second Mrs. Eldredge—” he remembered himself as Eldredge
moved quickly.
“Isabel, my second wife, Mr. Trant,” Eldredge burst out in the
bitterness of having to explain to a stranger his most intimate
emotion, “as I thought all the world knew, was my private secretary—my
stenographer—in this office. We were married a little over two years
ago. If you remember the way the papers treated her then, you will
understand what it would mean if this matter became public! The boy—”
he hesitated. “I suppose I must make the circumstances plain to you.
Seven years ago I married Edith Murray, Raymond’s sister. A year later
she died. About the same time my father died, and I had to take up the
business. Mrs. Murray, who was in the house at the time of Edith’s
death, was good enough to stay and take charge of my child and my
household.”
“And Mr. Murray? He stayed too?”
“Raymond was in college. Afterwards he came to my house, naturally.
Two years ago I married my second wife. At Mrs. Eldredge’s wish, as
much as my own, the Murrays remained with us. My wife appreciated even
better than I that her training had scarcely fitted her to take up at
once her social duties: the newspapers had prejudiced society against
her, so Mrs. Murray remained to introduce her socially.”
“I see—for over two years. But meanwhile Mrs. Eldredge had taken
charge of the child?”
“My wife was—not at ease with the boy.” Eldredge winced at the direct
question. “Edward liked her, but—I found her a hundred times crying
over her incompetence with children, and she was contented to let Mrs.
Murray continue to look after him. But after her own son was born—”
“Ah!” said Trant, expectantly.
“I shall conceal nothing. After her own son was born, I am obliged to
admit that Mrs. Eldredge’s attitude changed. She became insistent to
have charge of Edward, and his grandmother, Mrs. Murray, still
hesitated to trust Isabel. But finally I agreed to give my wife charge
of everything and complete control over Edward. If all went well, Mrs.
Murray was to reopen her old home and leave us, when—it was Tuesday
afternoon, three days ago, Mr. Trant—my wife took Edward, with her
maid, out in the motor. It was the boy’s sixth birthday. It was almost
the first time in his life he had left the house to go any distance
without his grandmother. My wife did not bring him back.
“Why she never brought him back—what happened to the boy, Mr. Trant,”
Eldredge stooped to a private drawer for papers, “I wish you to
determine for yourself from the evidence here. As soon as I saw how
personal a matter it was, I had my secretary, Miss Webster, take down
the evidence of the four people who saw the child taken away: my
chauffeur, Mrs. Eldredge’s maid, Miss Hendricks and Mrs. Eldredge. The
chauffeur, Morris, has been in my employ for five years. I am
confident that he is truthful. Moreover, he distinctly prefers Mrs.
Eldredge over everyone else. The maid, Lucy Carew, has been also
singularly devoted to my wife. She, too, is truthful.
“The testimony of the third person—Miss Hendricks—is far the most
damaging against my wife. Miss Hendricks makes a direct and inevasive
charge; it is practical proof. For I must tell you truthfully, Mr.
Trant, that Miss Hendricks is far the best educated and capable
witness of all. She saw the whole affair much nearer than any of the
others. She is a person of irreproachable character, a rich old maid,
living with her married sister on the street corner where the
kidnaping occurred. Moreover, her testimony, though more elaborate, is
substantiated in every important particular by both Morris and Lucy
Carew.”
Eldredge handed over the first pages.
“Against these, Mr. Trant, is this statement of—my wife’s. My home
faces the park, and is the second house from the street corner. There
is, however, no driveway entrance into the park at this intersecting
street. There are entrances a long block and a half away in one
direction and more than two blocks in the other. But the winding drive
inside the park approaches the front of the house within four hundred
feet, and is separated from it by the park greensward.”
“I understand.” Trant took the pages of evidence eagerly. Eldredge
went to the window and stood knotting the curtain cord in suspense.
But Murray crossed his legs, and, lighting a cigarette, watched Trant
attentively. Trant read the testimony of the chauffeur, which was
dated by Eldredge as taken Tuesday afternoon at five o’clock. It read
thus:
Mrs. Eldredge herself called to me about one o’clock to have the
motor ready at half-past two. Mrs. Eldredge and her maid and Master
Edward came down and got in. We went through the park, then down the
Lake Shore Drive almost to the river and turned back. Mrs. Eldredge
told me to return more slowly; we were almost forty minutes
returning where we had been less than twenty coming down. Reaching
the park, she wanted to go slower yet. She was very nervous and
undecided. She stopped the machine three or four times while she
pointed out things to Master Edward. She kept me winding in and out
the different roads. Suddenly she asked me the time, and I told her
it was just four; and she told me to go home at once. But on the
curved park road in front of the house and about four hundred feet
away from it, I “killed” my engine. I was some minutes starting it.
Mrs. Eldredge kept asking how soon we could go on; but I could not
tell her. After she had asked me three or four times, she opened the
door and let Master Edward down. I thought he was coming around to
watch me—a number of other boys had been standing about me just
before. But she sent him across the park lawn toward the house. I
was busy with my engine. Half a minute later the maid screamed. She
jumped down and grabbed me. A woman was making off with Master
Edward, running with him up the cross street toward the car line.
Master Edward was crying and fighting. Just then my engines started.
The maid and I jumped into the machine and went around by the park
driveway as fast as we could to the place where the woman had picked
up Master Edward. This did not take more than two minutes, but the
woman and Master Edward had disappeared. Mrs. Eldredge pointed out a
boy to me who was running up the street, but when we got to him it
was not Master Edward. We went all over the neighborhood at high
speed, but we did not find him. I think we might have found him if
Mrs. Eldredge had not first sent us after the other boy. I did not
see the woman who carried off Master Edward very plainly. She was
small.
Eldredge swung about and fixed on the young psychologist a look of
anxious inquiry. But without comment, Trant picked up the testimony of
the maid. It read:
Mrs. Eldredge told me after luncheon that we were going out in the
automobile with Master Edward. Master Edward did not want to go,
because it was his birthday and he had received presents from his
grandmother with which he wanted to play. Mrs. Eldredge—who was
excited—made him come. We went through the park and down the Lake
Shore Drive and came back again. It seemed to me that Mrs. Eldredge
was getting more excited, but I thought that it was because this was
the first time she had been out with Master Edward. But when we had
got back almost to the house the automobile broke down, and she
became more excited still. Finally she said to Master Edward that he
would better get out and run home, and she helped him out of the car
and he started. We could see him all the way, and could see right up
to the front steps of the house. But before he got there a woman
came running around the corner and started to run away with him. He
screamed, and I screamed, too, and took hold of Mrs. Eldredge’s arm
and pointed. But Mrs. Eldredge just sat still and watched. Then I
jumped up, and Mrs. Eldredge, who was shaking all over, put out her
hand. But I got past her and jumped out of the automobile. I
screamed again, and grabbed the chauffeur, and pointed. Just then
the engine started. We both got back into the automobile and went
around by the driveway in the park. All this happened as fast as you
can think, but we did not see either Master Edward or the woman.
Mrs. Eldredge did not cry or take on at all. I am sure she did not
scream when the woman picked up Master Edward, but she kept on being
very much excited. I saw the woman who carried Master Edward off
very plainly. She was a small blond, and wore a hat with
violet-colored flowers in it and a violet-colored tailor-made dress.
She looked like a lady.
Trant laid the maid’s testimony aside and looked up quickly.
“There is one extremely important thing, Mr. Eldredge,” he said. “Were
the witnesses examined separately?—that is, none of them heard the
testimony given by any other?”
“None of them, Mr. Trant.”
Then Trant picked up the testimony of Miss Hendricks, which read as
follows:
It so happened that I was looking out of the library window—though I
do not often look out at the window for fear people will think I am
watching them—when I saw the automobile containing Mrs. Eldredge,
Edward, the maid, and the chauffeur stop at the edge of the park
driveway opposite the Eldredge home. The chauffeur descended and
began doing something to the front of the car. But Mrs. Eldredge
looked eagerly around in all directions, and finally toward the
street corner on which our house stands; and almost immediately I
noticed a woman hurrying down the cross street toward the corner.
She had evidently just descended from a street car, for she came
from the direction of the car line; _and her haste made me
understand at once that she was late for some appointment_. As soon
as Mrs. Eldredge caught sight of the woman she lifted Edward from
the automobile to the ground, and pushed him in the woman’s
direction. She sent him across the grass toward her. At first,
however, the woman did not catch sight of Edward. Then she saw the
automobile, raised her hand and made a signal. _The signal was
returned by Mrs. Eldredge_, who pointed to the child. Immediately
the woman ran forward, pulled Edward along in spite of his
struggles, and ran toward the car line. It all happened very
quickly. I am confident the kidnaping was prearranged between Mrs.
Eldredge and the woman. I saw the woman plainly. She was small and
dark. Her face was marked by smallpox and she looked like an
Italian. She wore a flat hat with white feathers, a gray coat, and a
black skirt.
“You say you can have no doubt of Miss Hendricks’ veracity?” asked
Trant.
Eldredge shook his head, miserably. “I have known Miss Hendricks for a
number of years, and I should as soon accuse myself of falsehood. She
came running over to the house as soon as this had happened, and it
was from her account that I first learned, through Mrs. Murray, that
something had occurred.”
Trant’s glance fell to the remaining sheets in his hand, the testimony
of Mrs. Eldredge; and the psychologist’s slightly mismated eyes—blue
and gray—flashed suddenly as he read the following:
I had gone with Edward for a ride in the park to celebrate his
birthday. It was the first time we had been out together. We stopped
to look at the flowers and the animals. My husband had not told me
that he expected to be home from the store early, but Edward
reminded me that on his birthday his father always came home in the
middle of the afternoon and brought him presents. The time passed
quickly, and I was surprised when I learned that it was already four
o’clock. I was greatly troubled to think that Edward’s father might
be awaiting him, and we hurried back as rapidly as possible. We had
almost reached the house when the engine of the automobile stopped.
It took a very long time to fix it, and Edward was all the time
growing more excited and impatient to see his father. It was only a
short distance across the park to the house, which we could see
plainly. Finally I lifted Edward out of the machine and told him to
run across the grass to the house. He did so, but he went very
slowly. I motioned to him to hurry. Then suddenly I saw the woman
coming toward Edward, and the minute I saw her I was frightened. She
came toward him slowly, stopped, and talked with him for quite a
long time. She spoke loudly—I could hear her voice but I could not
make out what she said. Then she took his hand—it must have been ten
minutes after she had first spoken to him. He struggled with her,
but she pulled him after her. She went rather slowly. But it took a
very long time, perhaps fifteen minutes, for the motor to go around
by the drive; and when we got to the spot Edward and the woman had
disappeared. We looked everywhere, but could not find any trace of
them, and she would have had time to go a considerable distance—
Trant looked up suddenly at Eldredge who had left his position by the
window and over Trant’s shoulder was reading the testimony. His face
was gray.
“I asked Mrs. Eldredge,” the husband said, pitifully, “why, if she
suspected the woman from the first, and so much time elapsed, she did
not try to prevent the kidnaping, and—she would not answer me!”
Trant nodded, and read the final paragraph of Mrs. Eldredge’s
testimony:
The woman who took Edward was unusually large—a very big woman, not
stout, but tall and big. She was very dark, with black hair, and she
wore a red dress and a hat with red flowers in it.
The psychologist laid down the papers and looked from one to the other
of his companions reflectively. “What had happened that afternoon
before Mrs. Eldredge and the boy went motoring?” he asked abruptly.
“Nothing out of the ordinary, Mr. Trant,” said Eldredge. “Why do you
ask that?”
Trant’s fingertip followed on the table the last words of the
evidence. “And what woman does Mrs. Eldredge know that answers that
description—‘unusually large, not stout, but tall and big, very dark,
with black hair?’”
“No one,” said Eldredge.
“No one except,” young Murray laughed frankly, “my mother. Trant,” he
said, contemptuously, “don’t start any false leads of that sort! My
mother was with Walter at the time the kidnaping took place!”
“Mrs. Murray was with me,” Eldredge assented, “from four till five
o’clock that afternoon. She has nothing to do with the matter. But,
Trant, if you see in this mass of accusation one ray of hope that Mrs.
Eldredge is not guilty, for God’s sake give it to me, for I need it!”
The psychologist ran his fingers through his red hair and arose,
strongly affected by the appeal of the white-lipped man who faced him.
“I can give you more than a ray of hope, Mr. Eldredge,” he said. “I am
almost certain that Mrs. Eldredge not only did not cause your son’s
disappearance, but that she knows absolutely nothing about the matter.
And I am nearly, though not quite, so sure that this is not a case of
kidnaping at all!”
“What, Trant? Man, you can’t tell me that from that evidence?”
“I do, Mr. Eldredge!” Trant returned a little defiantly. “Just from
this evidence!”
“But, Trant,” the husband cried, trying to grasp the hope this
stranger gave him against all his better reason, “if you can think
that, why did she describe everything—the time, the circumstance, the
size and appearance of the woman and even the color of her dress—so
differently from all the rest? Why did she _lie_ when she told me
this, Mr. Trant?”
“I do not think she lied, Mr. Eldredge.”
“Then the rest lied and it _is_ a conspiracy of the witnesses against
her?”
“No; no one lied, I think. And there was no conspiracy. That is my
inference from the testimony and the one other fact we have—that there
had been no demand for ransom.”
Eldredge stared at him almost wildly. His brother-in-law moved up
beside him.
“Then where is my son, and who has taken him?”
“I cannot say yet,” Trant answered. There was a knock on the door.
“You asked to have everything personal brought to you at once, Mr.
Eldredge,” said Miss Webster, holding out a note. “This just came in
the ten o’clock delivery.” Eldredge snatched it from her—a soiled,
creased envelope bearing a postmark of the Lake View substation just
west of his home. It was addressed in a scrawling, illiterate hand,
and conspicuously marked personal. He tore it open, caught the import
of it almost at a glance; then with a smothered cry threw it on the
desk in front of Murray, who read it aloud.
Yure son E. is safe, and we have him where he is not in dangir. Your
wife has not payed us the money she promised us for taking him away,
and we do not consider we are bound any longer by our bargain with
her. If you will put the money she promised (one hund. dollars) on
the seat behind Lincoln’s statue in the Park tonight at ten thurty
(be exact) you will get yure son E. back. Look out for trubble to
the boy if you notify the police.
N. B.—If you try to make any investigation about this case our above
promiss will not be kept.
“Well, Trant, what do you say now?” asked Murray.
“That it was the only thing needed,” Trant answered, triumphantly, “to
complete my case. Now, I am sure I need only go to your house to make
a short examination of Mrs. Eldredge and the case against her!”
He swung about suddenly at a stifled exclamation behind him, and found
himself looking into the white face of the private secretary; but she
turned at once and left the office. Trant swung back to Murray. “No,
thank you,” he said, refusing the proffer of the paper. “I read from
the marks made upon minds by a crime, not from scrawls and thumbprints
upon paper. And my means of reading those marks are fortunately in my
possession this morning. No, I do not mean that I have other evidence
upon this case than that you have just given me, Mr. Eldredge,” Trant
explained. “I refer to my psychological apparatus which, the express
company notified me, arrived from New York this morning. If you will
let me have my appliance delivered direct to your house it will save
much time.”
“I will order it myself!” Eldredge took up the telephone and quickly
arranged the delivery.
“Thank you,” Trant acknowledged. “And if you will also see that I have
a photograph, a souvenir postal, or some sort of a picture of every
possible locality within a few blocks of your house you will probably
help in my examination greatly. Also,” he checked himself and stood
thoughtfully a moment, “will you have these words”—he wrote “Armenia,
invitation, inviolate, sedate” and “pioseer” upon a paper—“carefully
lettered for me and brought to your house?”
“What?” Eldredge stared at the list in astonishment. He looked up at
Trant’s direct, intelligent features and checked himself. “Is there
not some mistake in that last word, Mr. Trant? ‘Pioseer’ is not a word
at all.”
“I don’t wish it to be,” Trant replied. His glance fell suddenly on a
gaudily lithographed card—an advertisement showing the interior of a
room. He took it from the desk.
“This will be very helpful, Mr. Eldredge,” he said. “If you will have
this brought with the other cards I think that will be all. At three
o’clock, then, at your house?”
He left them, looking at each other in perplexity. He stopped a moment
at a newspaper office, and then returned to the University Club
thoughtfully. By the authority of all precedent procedure of the
world, he recognized how hopelessly the case stood against the
stepmother of the missing child. But by the authority of the new
science—the new knowledge of humanity—which he was laboring to
establish, he felt certain he could save her.
Yet he fully appreciated that he could accomplish nothing until his
experimental instruments were delivered. He must be content to wait
until he could test his belief in Mrs. Eldredge’s innocence for
himself, and at the same time convince Eldredge conclusively. So he
played billiards, and lunched, and was waiting for the hour he had set
with Eldredge, when he was summoned to the telephone. A man who said
he was Mrs. Eldredge’s chauffeur, informed him that Mrs. Eldredge was
in the motor before the club and she wished to speak with him at once.
Trant immediately went down to the motor.
The single woman in the curtained limousine had drawn back into the
farthest corner to avoid the glances of passersby. But as Trant came
toward the car she leaned forward and searched his face anxiously.
She was a wonderfully beautiful woman, though her frail face bore
evidences of long continued anxiety and of present excitement. Her
hair was unusually rich in color; the dilated, defiant eyes were deep
and flawless; the pale cheeks were clear and soft, and the trembling
lips were curved and perfect. Trant, before a word had been exchanged
between them, recognized the ineffable appeal of her personality.
“I must speak with you, Mr. Trant,” she said, as the chauffeur at her
nod, opened the door of the car. “I cannot leave the motor. You must
get in.”
Trant stepped quietly into the limousine, filled with the soft perfume
of her presence. The chauffeur closed the door behind him, and at once
started the car.
“My husband has consulted you, Mr. Trant, regarding the—the trouble
that has come upon us, the—the disappearance of his son, Edward,” she
asked.
“Why do you not say at once, Mrs. Eldredge, that you know he has
consulted me and asked me to come and examine you this afternoon? You
must have learned it through his secretary.”
The woman hesitated. “It is true,” she said nervously. “Miss Webster
telephoned me. I see that you have not forgotten that I was once my
husband’s stenographer, and—I still have friends in his office.”
“Then there is something you want to tell me that you cannot tell in
the presence of the others?”
The woman turned, her large eyes meeting his with an almost frightened
expression, but she recovered herself immediately. “No, Mr. Trant; it
is because I know that he—my husband—that no one is making any search,
or trying to recover Edward—except through watching me.”
“That is true, Mrs. Eldredge,” the psychologist helped her.
“You must not do that too, Mr. Trant!” she leaned toward him
appealingly. “You must search for the boy—my husband’s boy! You must
not waste time in questioning me, or in trying me with your new
methods! That is why I came to see you—to tell you, on my word of
honor, that I know nothing of it!”
“I should feel more certain if you would be frank with me,” Trant
returned, “and tell me what happened on that afternoon before the
child disappeared.”
“We went motoring,” the woman replied.
“Before you went motoring, Mrs. Eldredge,” the psychologist pressed,
“what happened?”
She shrank suddenly, and turned upon him eyes filled with
unconquerable terror. He waited, but she did not answer.
“Did not some one tell you,” the psychologist took a shot half in the
dark, “or accuse you that you were taking the child out in order to
get rid of him?”
The woman fell back upon the cushions, chalk-white and shuddering.
“You have answered me,” Trant said quietly. He glanced at her
pityingly, and as she shrank from him, he tingled with an unbidden
sympathy for this beautiful woman. “But in spite of the fact that you
never brought the boy back,” Trant cried impetuously, “and in spite
of—or rather because of all that is so dark against you, believe me
that I expect to clear you before them all!” He glanced at his watch.
“I am glad that you have been taking me toward your home, for it is
almost time for my appointment with your husband.”
The car was running on the street bounding the park on the west. It
stopped suddenly before a great stone house, the second from the
intersecting street.
Eldredge was running down the steps, and in a moment young Murray came
after him. The husband opened the door of the limousine and helped his
wife tenderly up the steps. Murray and Trant followed him together.
Eldredge’s second wife—though she could comprehend nothing of what lay
behind Trant’s assurance of help for her—met her husband’s look with
eyes that had suddenly grown bright. Murray stared from the woman to
Trant with disapproval. He nodded to the psychologist to follow him
into Eldredge’s study on one side; but there he waited for his
brother-in-law to return to voice his reproach.
“What have you been saying to her, Trant?” Eldredge demanded sternly
as he entered and shut the door.
“Only what I told you this morning,” the psychologist answered—“that I
believe her innocent. And after seeing what relief it brought her, I
can not be sorry!”
“You can’t?” Eldredge rebuked. “I can! When I called you in you had
the right to tell me whatever you thought, however wild and without
ground it was. It could not hurt me much. But now you have encouraged
my wife still to hold out against us—still to defy us and to deny that
she knows anything when—when, since we saw you, the case has become
only more conclusive against her. We have just discovered a most
startling confirmation of Miss Hendrick’s evidence. Raymond, show
him!” he gestured in sorry triumph.
Young Murray opened the library desk and pulled out a piece of
newspaper, which he put in Trant’s hand. He pointed to the heading.
“You see, Trant, it is the account of the kidnaping in St. Louis which
occurred just before Edward was stolen.”
All witnesses describe the kidnaper as a short, dark woman, marked
with smallpox. She wore a gray coat and black skirt, a hat with
white feathers, and appeared to be an Italian.
“I knew that. It exactly corresponds with the woman described by Miss
Hendricks,” Trant rejoined. “I was aware of it this morning. But I can
only repeat that the case has turned more and more conclusively in
favor of Mrs. Eldredge.”
“Why, even before we recognized the woman described by Miss Hendricks
the evidence was conclusive against Isabel!” Murray shot back.
“Listen! She was nervously excited all that day; when the woman
snatched Edward, Isabel did nothing. She denies she signaled the
woman, but Miss Hendricks saw the signal. Isabel says the automobile
took fifteen minutes making the circuit in the park, which is
ridiculous! But she wants to give an idea in every case exactly
contrary to what really occurred, and the other witnesses are agreed
that the run was very quick. And most of all, she tried to throw us
off in her description of the woman. The other three are agreed that
she was short and slight. Isabel declares she was large and tall. The
testimony of the chauffeur and the maid agrees with Miss Hendricks’ in
every particular—except that the maid says the woman was dressed in
violet. In that one particular she is probably mistaken, for Miss
Hendricks’ description is most minute. Certainly the woman was not, as
Isabel has again and again repeated in her efforts to throw us off the
track, and in the face of all other evidence, clothed in a red dress!”
“Very well summarized!” said Trant. “Analyzed and summarized just as
evidence has been ten million times in a hundred thousand law courts
since the taking of evidence began. You could convict Mrs. Eldredge on
that evidence. Juries have convicted thousands of other innocent
people on evidence less trustworthy. The numerous convictions of
innocent persons are as black a shame to-day as burnings and
torturings were in the Middle Ages; as tests by fire and water, or as
executions for witchcraft. Courts take evidence to-day exactly as it
was taken when Joseph was a prisoner in Egypt. They hang and imprison
on grounds of ‘precedent’ and ‘common sense.’ They accept the word of
a witness where its truth seems likely, and refuse it where it seems
otherwise. And, having determined the preponderance of evidence, they
sometimes say, as you have just said of Lucy Carew, ‘though correct in
everything else, in this one particular fact our truthful witness is
mistaken.’ There is no room for mistakes, Mr. Eldredge, in scientific
psychology. Instead of analyzing evidence by the haphazard methods of
the courts, we can analyze it scientifically, exactly,
incontrovertibly—we can select infallibly the true from the false. And
that is what I mean to do now,” he added, “if my apparatus, for which
you telephoned this morning, has come.”
“The boxes are in the rear hall,” Eldredge replied. “I have obtained
over a hundred views of the locality, and the cards you requested me
to secure are here too.”
“Good! Then you will get together the witnesses? The maid and the
chauffeur I need to see only for a moment. I will question them while
you are sending for Miss Hendricks.”
Eldredge rang for the butler. “Bring in those boxes which have just
come for Mr. Trant,” he commanded. “Send this note to Miss
Hendricks”—he wrote a few lines swiftly—“and tell Lucy and Morris to
come here at once.”
He watched Trant curiously while he bent to his boxes and began taking
out his apparatus. Trant first unpacked a varnished wooden box with a
small drop window in one end. Opposite the window was a rack upon
which cards or pictures could be placed. They could then be seen only
through the drop-window. This window worked like the shutter of a
camera, and was so controlled that it could be set to remain open for
a fixed time, in seconds or parts of a second, after which it closed
automatically. As Trant set this up and tested the shutter, the maid
and chauffeur came to the door of the library. Trant admitted the girl
and shut the door.
“On Tuesday afternoon,” he said to her, kindly, “was Mrs. Eldredge
excited—very much excited—_before_ you came to the place where the
machine broke down, and before she saw the woman who took Edward
away?”
“Yes, sir,” the girl answered. “She was more excited than I’d seen her
ever before, all the afternoon, from the time we started.”
The young psychologist then admitted the chauffeur, and repeated his
question.
“She was most nervous, yes, sir; and excited, sir, from the very
first,” the chauffeur answered.
“That is all,” said Trant, suddenly dismissing both, then turning
without expression to Eldredge. “If Miss Hendricks is here I will
examine her at once.”
Eldredge went out, and returned with the little old maid. Miss
Hendricks had a high-bred, refined and delicate face; and a sweet,
though rather loquacious, manner. She acknowledged the introduction to
Trant with old-fashioned formality.
“Please sit down, Miss Hendricks,” said Trant, motioning her to a
chair facing the drop-window of the exposure box. “This little window
will open and stand open an instant. I want you to look in and read
the word that you will see.” He dropped a card quickly into the rack.
“Do not be surprised,” he begged, as she looked at the drop-window
curiously, “if this examination seems puerile to you. It is not really
so; but only unfamiliar in this country, yet. The Germans have carried
psychological work further than any one in this nation, though the
United States is now awakening to its importance.” While speaking, he
had lifted the shutter and kept it raised a moment.
“It must be very interesting,” Miss Hendricks commented. “That word
was ‘America,’ Mr. Trant.”
Trant changed the card quickly. “And I’m glad to say, Miss Hendricks,”
he continued, while the maiden lady watched for the next word,
interested, “that Americans are taking it up intelligently, not
servilely copying the Germans!”
“That word was ‘imitation,’ Mr. Trant!” said Miss Hendricks.
“So now much is being done,” Trant continued, again shifting the card,
“in the fifty psychological laboratories of this country through
painstaking experiments and researches.”
“And that word was ‘investigate!’” said Miss Hendricks, as the shutter
lifted and dropped again.
“That was quite satisfactory, Miss Hendricks,” Trant acknowledged.
“Now look at this please.” Trant swiftly substituted the lithograph he
had picked up at Eldredge’s office. “What was that, Miss Hendricks?”
“It was a colored picture of a room with several people in it.”
“Did you see the boy in the picture, Miss Hendricks?”
“Why—yes, of course, Mr. Trant,” the woman answered, after a little
hesitation.
“Good. Did you also see his book?”
“Yes; I saw that he was reading.”
“Can you describe him?”
“Yes; he was about fifteen years old, in a dark suit with a brown tie,
black-haired, slender, and he sat in a corner with a book on his
knee.”
“That was indeed most satisfactory! Thank you, Miss Hendricks.” Trant
congratulated and dismissed her. “Now your wife, if you please, Mr.
Eldredge.”
Eldredge was curiously turning over the cards which Trant had been
exhibiting, and stared at the young psychologist in bewilderment. But
at Trant’s words he went for his wife. She came down at once with Mrs.
Murray. Though she had been described to him, it was the first time
Trant had seen the grandmother of the missing boy; and, as she
entered, a movement of admiration escaped him. She was taller even
than her son—who was the tallest man in the room—and she had retained
surprisingly much of the grace and beauty of youth. She was a majestic
and commanding figure. After settling her charge in a chair, she
turned solicitously to Trant.
“Mr. Eldredge tells me that you consider it necessary to question poor
Isabel again,” she said. “But, Mr. Trant, you must be careful not to
subject her to any greater strain than is necessary. We all have told
her that if she would be entirely frank with us we would make
allowance for one whose girlhood has been passed in poverty which
obliged her to work for a living.”
Mrs. Eldredge shrank nervously and Trant turned to Murray. “Mr.
Murray,” he said, “I want as little distraction as possible during my
examination of Mrs. Eldredge, so if you will be good enough to bring
in to me from the study the automatograph—the other apparatus which I
took from the box—and then wait outside till I have completed the
test, it will assist me greatly. Mrs. Murray, you can help me if you
remain.”
Young Murray glanced at his mother and complied. The automatograph,
which Trant set upon another table, was that designed by Prof.
Jastrow, of the University of Wisconsin, for the study of involuntary
movements. It consisted of a plate of glass in a light frame mounted
on adjustable brass legs, so that it could be set exactly level. Three
polished glass balls, three-quarters of an inch in diameter, rested on
this plate; and on these again there rested a very light plate of
glass. To the upper plate was connected a simple system of levers,
which carried a needle point at their end, so holding the needle as to
travel over a sheet of smoked paper.
While Trant was setting up this instrument Mrs. Eldredge’s nervousness
had greatly increased. And the few words which she spoke to her
husband and Mrs. Murray—who alone remained in the room—showed that her
mind was filled with thoughts of the missing child. Trant, observing
her, seemed to change his plan suddenly and, instead of taking Mrs.
Eldredge to the new instrument, he seated her in the chair in front of
the drop-window. He explained gently to the trembling woman that he
wanted her to read to him the words he exposed; and, as in the case of
Miss Hendricks, he tried to put her at ease by speaking of the test
itself.
“These word tests, Mrs. Eldredge, will probably seem rather pointless.
For that matter all proceedings with which one is not familiar must
seem pointless; even the proceedings of the national legislature in
Washington seem pointless to the spectators in the gallery.” At this
point the shutter lifted and exposed a word. “What was the word,
please, Mrs. Eldredge?”
“‘Sedate,’” the woman faltered.
“But though the tests seem pointless, Mrs. Eldredge, they are not
really so. To the trained investigator each test word is as full of
meaning as each mark upon the trail is to the backwoodsman on the edge
of civilization. Now what word was that?” he questioned quickly, as
the shutter raised and lowered again.
The woman turned her dilated eyes on Trant. “That—that,” she
hesitated—“I could make it out only as ‘p-i-o-s-e-e-r,’” she spelled,
uneasily. “I do not know any such word.”
“I shall not try you on words any longer, Mrs. Eldredge,” Trant
decided. He took his stop-watch in his hand. “But I shall ask you to
tell me how much time elapses between two taps with my lead pencil on
the table. Now!”
“Two minutes,” the woman stammered.
Eldredge, who, observing what Trant was doing, had taken his own watch
from his pocket and timed the brief interval, stared at Trant in
astonishment. But without giving the wife time to compose herself,
Trant went on quickly:
“Look again at the little window, Mrs. Eldredge. I shall expose to you
a photograph; and if you are to help me recover your husband’s son, I
hope you can recognize it. Who was it?” the psychologist demanded as
the shutter dropped.
“That was a photograph of Edward!” the woman cried. “But I never saw
that picture before!” She sat back, palpitating with uneasiness.
Mrs. Murray quickly took up the picture which had just been recognized
as her grandson. “That is not Edward, Mr. Trant,” she said.
Trant laid a finger on his lips to silence her.
“Mrs. Murray,” he said in quick appeal, “I wished, as you probably
noted, to use this instrument, the automatograph, a moment ago: I will
try it now. Will you be good enough to test it for me? Merely rest
your fingers lightly—as lightly as you please—upon this upper glass
plate.” Mrs. Murray complied, willingly. “Now please hold your hand
there while I lay out these about you.” He swiftly distributed the
photographic views of the surrounding blocks which Eldredge had
collected for him.
Mrs. Murray watched him curiously as he placed about a dozen in a
circle upon the table; and, almost as swiftly, swept them away and
distributed others in their place. Again, after glancing at her hand
to see that it was held in position, he set out a third lot, his eyes
fixed, as before, on the smoked paper under the needle at the end of
the levers. Suddenly he halted, looked keenly at the third set of
cards and, without a word, left the room. In an instant he returned
and after a quick, sympathetic glance at Mrs. Eldredge, turned to her
husband.
[Illustration: A table with four people around it. A younger woman
sits and watches the others. A gentleman stands slightly behind the
others. An older woman stands with one hand resting on a flat
instrument, and gazes at the cards which a younger man is placing
about her on the table.]
Caption: After glancing at her hand to see that it was held in
position, he set out a third lot
“I need not examine Mrs. Eldredge further,” he said. “You had better
take her to her room. But before you go,” he grasped the woman’s cold
hand encouragingly, “I want to tell you, Mrs. Eldredge, that I have
every assurance of having the boy back within a very few minutes, and
I have proof of your complete innocence. No, Mrs. Murray,” he forbade,
as the older woman started to follow the others. “Remain here.” He
closed the door after the other and faced her. “I have just sent your
son to get Edward Eldredge from the place on Clark Street just south
of Webster Avenue where you have been keeping him these three days.”
“Are you a madman?” the powerful woman cried, as she tried to push by
him, staring at him stonily.
“Really it is no use, madam.” Trant prevented her. “Your son has been
a most unworthy confederate from the first; and when I had excluded
him from the room for a few moments and spoke to him of the place
which you pointed out to me so definitely, it frightened him into
acquiescence. I expect him back with the boy within a few minutes: and
meanwhile—”
“What is that?” Eldredge had stepped inside the door.
“I was just telling Mrs. Murray,” said Trant, “that I had sent Raymond
Murray after your son in the place where she has had him concealed.”
“What—what?” the father cried, incredulously, staring into the woman’s
cold face.
“Oh, she has most enviable control of herself,” Trant commented. “She
will not believe that her son has gone for Edward until he brings him
back. And I might say that Mrs. Murray probably did not make away with
the boy, but merely had him kept away, after he had been taken.”
Mrs. Murray had reseated herself, after her short struggle with Trant;
and her face was absolutely devoid of expression. “He is a madman!”
she said, calmly.
“Perhaps it will hasten matters,” suggested Trant, “if I explain to
you the road by which I reached this conclusion. As a number of
startling cases of kidnaping have occurred recently, the very
prevalent fear they have aroused has made it likely that kidnaping
will be the first theory in any case even remotely resembling it. In
view of this I could accept your statement of kidnaping only if the
circumstances made it conclusive, which they did not. With the absence
of any demand for a real ransom they made it impossible even for you
to hold the idea of kidnaping, except by presuming it a plot of Mrs.
Eldredge’s.
“But when I began considering whether this could be her plan, as
charged, I noted a singular inconsistency in the attitude of Raymond
Murray. He showed obvious eagerness to disgrace Mrs. Eldredge, but for
some reason—not on the surface—was most actively opposed to police
interference and the publicity which would most thoroughly carry out
his object. So I felt from the first that he, and perhaps his
mother—who was established over Mrs. Eldredge in her own home, but, by
your statement, was to leave if Mrs. Eldredge came into charge of
things—knew something which they were concealing. This much I saw
before I read a word of the evidence.
“The evidence of the maid and the chauffeur told only two things—that
a small woman rushed into the park and ran off with your son; and that
your wife was in an extremely agitated condition. The maid said that
the woman was blond and dressed in violet; and I knew, when I had read
the evidence of other witnesses, that that was undoubtedly the truth.”
Eldredge, pacing the rug, stopped short and opened his lips; but
checked himself.
“Without Miss Hendricks’ testimony there was positively nothing
against your wife in the evidence of the chauffeur and the maid. I
then took up Miss Hendricks’ evidence and had not read two lines
before I saw that—as an accusation against your wife, Mr. Eldredge—it
was worthless. Miss Hendricks is one of those most dangerous persons,
absolutely truthful, and—absolutely unable to tell the truth! She
showed a common, but hopeless, state of suggestibility. Her first
sentence, in which she said she did not often look out of the window
for fear people would think she was watching them, showed her habit of
confusing what she saw with ideas that existed only in her own mind.
Her testimony was a mass of unwarranted inferences. She saw a woman
coming from the direction of the car line, so to Miss Hendricks ‘it
was evident that she had just descended from a car.’ The woman was
hurrying, so ‘she was late for an appointment.’ ‘As soon as she caught
sight of the woman’ Mrs. Eldredge lifted Edward to the ground. And so
on through a dozen things which showed the highest susceptibility to
suggestion. You told me that before telling her story to you she had
told it to Mrs. Murray. Miss Hendricks had rushed to her at once; the
bias and suggestions which made her testimony apparently so damning
against your wife could only have come from Mrs. Murray.”
Eldredge’s glance shot to his mother-in-law. But Trant ran on rapidly.
“I took up your wife’s evidence; and though apparently entirely at
variance with the others, I saw at once that it really corroborated
the testimony of the nurse and the chauffeur.”
“Her evidence confirmed?” Eldredge demanded, brusquely.
“Yes,” Trant replied; “to the psychologist, who understood Mrs.
Eldredge’s mental condition, her evidence was the same as theirs. I
had already seen for myself, by the aid of what you had told me, Mrs.
Eldredge’s position in this household, after leaving your office to
become your wife. On entering your house, she was brought face to face
with a woman already in control here—a strong and dominant woman, who
had immense influence over you. Everything told of a struggle between
these women—slights, obstructions, merciless criticisms, of which your
wife could not complain, which had brought her close to nervous
prostration. You remember that immediately after reading her statement
I asked you what particular thing had occurred just before she went
motoring to throw her into that noticeably excitable condition
described by the maid and the chauffeur. You said nothing had
happened. But I was certain even then that there had been something—I
know now that Mrs. Murray had put a climax to her persecution of your
wife by charging that Mrs. Eldredge was taking the boy out to get rid
of him—and my knowledge of psychology told me that, allowing for Mrs.
Eldredge’s hysterical condition, she had stated in her evidence the
same things that the maid and the chauffeur had stated. It is a fact
that in her condition of hyperæsthesia—a condition readily brought on
not only in weak women, but sometimes in strong men, by excitement and
excessive nervous strain—her senses would be highly overstimulated.
Barely hearing the sound of the woman’s voice, she would honestly
describe her as speaking in a loud tone.
“All time intervals would also be greatly prolonged. It truly seemed
to her that the child took a long time to cross the grass and that the
woman talked with him several minutes, instead of seconds. The
sensation of a similarly long time elapsing after the woman took the
boy’s hand gave her the impression of a long struggle. She would
honestly believe that it took the automobile fifteen minutes to make
the circuit of the park. When you asked your wife why, if so much time
elapsed, she tried to do nothing, she was unable to answer; for no
time was wasted at all.
“But most vital of all, I recognized her description of the woman as
wearing a red dress as most conclusive confirmation of the maid’s
testimony and a final proof, not that Mrs. Eldredge was trying to
mislead you, but that she was telling the truth as well as she could.
For it is a common psychological fact that in a hysterical condition
red is the color most commonly seen subjectively; the sensation of red
not only persists in hysteria, when other color sensations disappear,
but it is common to have it take the place of another color,
especially violet. It was discovered and recorded over thirty years
ago that, in excessive excitability known psychologically as
hyperæsthesia, all colors are lifted in the spectrum scale and, to the
overexcited retina, the shorter waves of violet may give the sensation
of the longer ones producing red. So what to you seemed an intentional
contradiction was to me the most positive and complete assurance of
your wife’s honesty.
“And finally, to be consistent with this condition, I knew that if her
state was due to expectation of harm to herself or the child from any
unusually large, dark woman, she would see the woman in her
excitement, as large and dark. For it is one of the commonest facts
known to the psychologist that our senses in excitement can be so
influenced by our expectation of any event that we actually see
things, not as they are, but as we expect them to be. So when you told
me that Mrs. Murray answered the description given by Mrs. Eldredge,
all threads of the skein had led to Mrs. Murray.
“Now, as it was clear to me that Mrs. Murray herself had used Miss
Hendricks’ easy suggestibility to prejudice her evidence against Mrs.
Eldredge, Mrs. Murray could not herself have believed that Mrs.
Eldredge had taken the boy away. So, since the Murrays were making no
search, they must have soon found out where the boy was and were
satisfied that he was safe and that they could produce him, after they
had finished ruining Mrs. Eldredge.
“Therefore I was in a position to appreciate Mrs. Murray’s ridiculous
letter when it came, with its painfully misspelled demand for an
absurdly small ransom that would not be refused for a moment, as the
object of the letter was only to make the final move in the case
against Mrs. Eldredge and enable them to return the boy. So far, it is
clear?” Trant checked his rapid explanation.
Still Eldredge stared at the set, defiant features of his
mother-in-law; and made no reply.
“I appreciated thoroughly that I must prove all this,” Trant then shot
on rapidly. “You, Mr. Eldredge, discovered that Miss Hendricks’
description of the woman tallied precisely with the published
description of the St. Louis kidnaper, without appreciating that the
description was in her mind. With her high suggestibility she
substituted it for the woman she actually saw as unconsciously—and as
honestly—as she substituted Mrs. Murray’s suggestions for her own
observations.
“But perhaps you can appreciate it now. You saw how I showed her the
word ‘Armenia’ and spoke of the United States to lead her mind to
substitute ‘America’ to prove how easily her mind substituted acts,
motions and everything at Mrs. Murray’s suggestion. I had only to
speak of ‘servilely copying’ to have her change ‘invitation’ into
‘imitation.’ A mere mention of researches made her think she saw
‘investigate,’ when the word was ‘inviolate.’ Finally, after showing
her a picture in which there were two women and a man, but no boy, she
stated, at my slight suggestion, that she saw a boy, and even
described him for me and told me what he was doing. I had proved
beyond cavil the utter worthlessness of evidence given by this woman,
and dismissed her.”
“I followed that!” Eldredge granted.
Trant continued: “So I tested your wife to show that she had not
suggestibility, like Miss Hendricks—that is, she could not be made to
say that she saw ‘senate’ instead of ‘sedate’ by a mere mention of the
national legislature at the time the word was shown; nor would she
make over ‘pioseer’ into ‘pioneer,’ under the suggestion of
backwoodsman. But by getting her into an excitable condition with her
mind emotionally set to expect a picture of the missing boy, her
excited mind at the moment of perception altered the picture of the
totally different six-year-old boy I showed her into the picture of
Edward, as readily as her highly excited senses—fearing for herself
and for the boy through Mrs. Murray—altered the woman she saw taking
Edward into an emotional semblance of Mrs. Murray.
“I had understood it as essential to clear your wife as to find the
boy—whom I appreciated could be in no danger. So I made the next test
with Mrs. Murray. This, I admit, depended largely upon chance. I knew,
of course, that she must know where the boy was and that probably her
son did too. The place was also probably in the vicinity. The
automatograph is a device to register the slightest and most
involuntary motions. It is a basic psychological fact that there is an
inevitable muscular impulse toward any object which arouses emotion.
If one spreads a score of playing cards about a table and the subject
has a special one in mind, his hand on the automatograph will quickly
show a faint impulse toward the card, although the subject is entirely
unaware of it. So I knew that if the place where the boy was kept was
shown in any of the pictures, I would get a reaction from Mrs. Murray;
which I did—with the result, Mr. Eldredge,” Trant went to the window
and watched the street, expectantly, “that Mr. Raymond Murray is now
bringing your son around the corner and—”
But the father had burst from the room and toward the door. Trant
heard a cry of joy and the stumble of an almost hysterical woman as
Mrs. Eldredge rushed down the stairs after her husband. He turned as
Mrs. Murray, taking advantage of the excitement, endeavored to push
past him.
“You are leaving the house?” he asked. “But tell me first,” he
demanded, “how did the boy come to be taken out of the park? Had the
boys whom the chauffeur said stopped around his car anything to do
with it?”
“They were a class which a kindergarten teacher—a new teacher—had
taken to see the animals,” the woman answered, coldly.
“Ah! So one of them was left behind—the one whom they saw running and
mistook for Edward—and the teacher, running back, took Edward by
mistake. But she must have discovered her mistake when she rejoined
the others.”
“Only after she got on the car. There one of my former servants
recognized him and took him to her home.”
“And when the servant came to tell you, and you understood how Miss
Hendricks’ suggestibility had played into your hands, the temptation
was too much for you, and you made this last desperate attempt to
discredit Mrs. Eldredge. I see!” He stood back and let her by.
Raymond Murray, after bringing back the boy, had disappeared. In the
hall Eldredge and his wife bent over the boy, the woman completely
hysterical in the joy of the recovery, laughing and crying
alternately. She caught the boy to her frantically as she stared
wildly at a woman ascending the steps.
“The woman in red—the woman in red!” she cried suddenly.
Trant stepped to her side quickly. “But she doesn’t look big and dark
to you now, does she?” he asked. “And see, now,” he said, trying to
calm her, “the dress is violet again. Yes, Mr. Eldredge, this, I
believe, is the woman in violet—the small blond woman who took your
boy from the park by mistake—as I will explain to you. She is coming,
undoubtedly, in response to an advertisement that I put in _The
Journal_ this noon. But we do not require her help now, for Mrs.
Murray has told me all.”
The maid, Lucy Carew, ran suddenly up the hall.
“Mrs. Murray and Mr. Murray are leaving the house, Mr. Eldredge!” she
cried, bewilderedly.
“Are they?” the master of the house returned. He put his arm about its
mistress and together they took the boy to his room.