“Ready, now, Shag! Ready!” called Colonel Ashley, in tense tones. “Ready
with the net!”
“Yes, sah! All ready!”
“I've got him about ready for you! And he's better than I thought!”
“Yes, sah, Colonel! I won't miss!”
“If you do you may look for another place!” At this dire threat Shag
turned as white as he would ever become, and took a firmer grip on the
“Ready now, Shag!” called the colonel, at the same time directing his
helper to come down the bank toward a little pool whither he was leading
the now well-played fish. “Ready!”
Shag did not speak, but while the colonel slowly reeled in and the tip
of the slender pole bent like a bow, he slipped the net into the water,
under the fish, and, a moment later, had it out on the grass.
“There!” exclaimed the famous detective, with a sigh of relief. “There
he is, and as fine a fish as I've ever landed in these parts! Now,
Shag--”
But there came an interruption. Reasoning that now was a most propitious
time to make his appeal, Harry Bartlett advanced to where the colonel
and Shag were bending over the panting bass. As the detective, with
a smart blow back of its head, put his catch out of misery, Bartlett
spoke.
“Excuse me,” he said, deferentially enough, for he saw the type of man
with whom he had to deal, “but are you not Colonel Ashley?”
“I am, sir!” and the colonel looked up as he slipped the fish into his
grass-lined creel.
“I am Mr. Bartlett. I followed you here from New York, and I wish to--”
“If it's anything about business, Mr. Bartlett, let me save your time
and my own--both valuable, I take it--by stating that I came here to
fish, and not to talk business. Excuse me for putting it thus bluntly,
but I see no reason for many words. I can not consider any business.
That is all attended to at my New York office, and I am surprised that
they should even have given you my address. I told them not to.”
“It was no easy matter to get it, Colonel, I assure you,” and--Bartlett
smiled genially. “And please don't blame any one in your office for
disclosing your whereabouts. I did not get your address from them, I
assure you.”
“From whom, then, if I may ask?”
“From Spotty.” And again Bartlett smiled.
“What? Spotty Morgan?”
“Yes.”
“Are you--do you know him?” and the detective could not keep the
interest out of his voice.
“Rather well. I saved him from drowning once some years ago, and he
hasn't forgotten it. It was at a summer resort, and Spotty, though he is
a good swimmer, didn't estimate the force of the undertow. I pulled him
out just in time.”
“Strange,” murmured the colonel. “A strange coincidence.”
“I beg pardon,” said Harry politely.
“Oh, nothing,” went on the detective. “Only, as it happens, Spotty saved
my life some time ago. It's just a coincidence, that's all. So Spotty
gave you my address, did he?”
“Yes. I had called at your New York office, and, as you say, your clerks
had orders not to disclose your whereabouts. I used every cajolery
and device of which I was master, but it was no avail. I urged the
importance it was to myself and others to know where you were, but they
were obdurate. I was coming out, much disappointed, when I saw Spotty
emerging from an inner office. He knew me at once, though it is years
since we met, and going down in the elevator I mentioned that I was
looking for you. I told him something of the reason for wanting to find
you and--Well, he told me you were here.”
“And he is about the only person in New York outside of my most
confidential man who could have done that,” observed the colonel, as he
slowly reeled up his line. “One reason why the clerks in my office could
not give you my address was because they did not have it. So Spotty, who
must just have finished his bit, told.”
“But please don't hold that against him,” urged Bartlett. “If he
violated a confidence--”
“He did, in a way, yes,” observed the disciple of Izaak Walton. “But I
shall have to forgive him, I suppose. It must have been rather a strong
reason that induced him to tell you where I had gone.”
“It was, Colonel Ashley, the strongest reason in the world. It is to
help clear up the mystery--”
“Stop!” fairly shouted the colonel. “If it's a detective case I don't
want to hear it! Not a word! Shag, show this gentleman the door--I beg
your pardon, I didn't mean to be rude,” went on the colonel with his
usual politeness. “But I really can not listen. I came here to rest and
fish, not to take up new detective cases. You know where my office is.
They will attend to you there. I have given up business for the time
being.”
“And yet, Colonel Ashley, the person who sent me will have no one but
you. She says you are the only one who can get at the bottom of the
puzzling case.”
In spite of himself the colonel's face lighted up at the words “puzzling
case,” but as his eyes fell on the creel containing his fish he turned
aside. “No,” he said, “I am sorry, but I can not listen to you. Shag,
kindly--”
Harry Bartlett was not a successful business man for nothing. He knew
how to make an appeal. “I came to see you at the request of Miss Viola
Carwell,” he said slowly. “She sent me to find you--told me not to come
back to her without you. A change came over the colonel's face at the
mention of Viola's name.
“You came from her--from the daughter of Horace Carwell?” he asked
quickly.
“I did,” answered Bartlett.
“Well, of course, that might make a difference. I hope my old friend is
not in trouble--nor his daughter,” and there was a new quality in the
voice.
“Mr. Carwell's troubles are all over--if he had any,” returned Bartlett
simply.
“You mean--”
“He is dead.”
The colonel uttered an exclamation.
“Pardon my rather brusk reception of you,” he apologized. “I did not
know that. Was it recently--suddenly?”
“Both recently and suddenly.”
“I did not know that I seldom read the papers, and have not looked at
one lately. I had not heard that he was ill.”
“'He wasn't, Colonel Ashley. Mr. Carwell died very suddenly on the
Maraposa Golf Club links, after making a stroke that gave him the
championship.”
“Heart disease or apoplexy?”
“Neither one. It was poison.”
“You amaze me, Mr.--er--Mr.--”
“Bartlett. Yes, Mr. Carwell died of poison, as the autopsy showed.”
“'Was he--did he--”
“That is what we want to find out,” interrupted the messenger eagerly.
“The county physician says Mr. Carwell is a suicide. His daughter, Miss
Viola, can not believe it. Nor can I. There has been some talk that his
affairs are involved. As you may have known, he was somewhat of a--”
“His sporting proclivities were somewhat different from mine,” said the
old detective dryly. “You needn't explain. Every man must live his own
life. But tell me more.”
Thereupon Bartlett gave the details as he knew them, bearing on the
death of the father of the girl he loved.
“And she sent you to find me?” asked the detective.
“Yes. Miss Viola said you were an old friend of her father's, and if any
one could solve the mystery of his death you could. For that there is a
mystery about it, many of us believe.”
“There may be. Poison is always more or less of a mystery. But just what
do you want me to do?”
“Come back with me if you will, Colonel Ashley. Miss Carwell wants you
to aid her--aid all of us, for we are all at sea. Will you? She sent
me to plead with you. I went to your New York office, and from Spotty
Morgan learned you were here. I--”
“I suppose I shall have to forgive Spotty,” murmured the fisherman.
“They told me at the hotel you had come here,” went on Bartlett, “so I
followed. I was lucky in finding you.”
“I don't know about that,” murmured the colonel, smiling. “It may be
unfortunate. Well, I am deeply shocked at my old friend's death--and
such a tragic taking off. Horace Carwell was my very good friend. He
once did me a great service, when I needed money badly, by helping me
make an investment in copper that turned out extremely well. I feel
myself under obligations to him; and, since he is no more, I must
transfer that obligation to his daughter.”
“Then you'll come with me to see her, Colonel Ashley?”
“Yes. Shag, pack up! We're going back to civilization.”
The colored man's face was a study. He looked at the quiet stream, at
the drooping willows, at the fish rod in his master's hand, and at the
creel. He opened his mouth and spoke:
“But, Colonel, yo' done tole me t'--”
“No matter what I told you, Shag, these are new orders. Pack up!” came
the crisp command. “We're going back to town. I'll do what I can in this
case,” he went on to Bartlett. “I came here for some quiet fishing, and
to get my mind off detective work. I was dragged into a diamond cross
mystery not long since, sorely against my will, and now--”
“I am sorry--” began Bartlett.
“Oh, well, it can't be helped,” the colonel said. “I'd give up more than
a fishing trip for a daughter of Horace Carwell. You may let her know
that I'll come, if it will give her any comfort. Though, mind you,” the
colonel's manner was impressive, “I promise nothing.”
“That is understood,” said Bartlett eagerly. “I'll wire her that you
are coming. There's a train that leaves right after supper. We can get
that--”
“I'll take it!” decided the colonel. Now that he had given up his
cherished fishing he was all business again. “Shag!”
“Yes, sah, Colonel!”
“Pack up for the evening train. Give that fish to the cook and have it
served for Mr. Bartlett and myself. You'll dine with me,” he went on. It
was an order, not an invitation, but Bartlett understood, and accepted
with a bow.
A few hours later he and the colonel left the little town where the
detective had gone for such a short vacation, and were on their way to
Lakeside, which they reached early in the morning.
“Now if you'll tell me the best hotel to stop at here,” said the
colonel, as they alighted from the train, “I'll put up there and see
Miss Carwell.”
“She requested me to bring you at once to her home,” said Bartlett. “You
are to be her guest. She thought perhaps you would want to examine the--
to see Mr. Carwell's body--before--”
“Oh, yes. I suppose I had better. Then the funeral has not been held?”
“No, it was postponed at the request of the county physician.”
“Has there been a coroner's inquest?”
“No. None was deemed necessary at the time I left, at the solicitation
of Miss Carwell, to get you.”
“I see. Inquests are less often held in New Jersey than in some of the
other states. Well, then I suppose I may as well go to the Carwell home
with you.”
“Yes. I wired for my car to meet us. It's here I see. Right over here.”
Bartlett led the way, the colonel following, and Shag bringing up the
rear with the bags.
As the machine started from the station Bartlett looked up to the
morning sky. There was a little speck in it, no larger than a man's
hand. It grew larger, and became an osprey on its way to the sea in
search of a fish.
As the car drew up in front of the Carwell mansion, from the bell of
which fluttered a dismal length of crepe, a man stepped from the shadow
of the gate posts and held out a paper to Harry Bartlett.
“What is it?” asked Bartlett.
“A subpoena,” was the rather gruff answer.
“A subpoena? What for?”
“The coroner's inquest. You'll have to appear and give evidence. They're
going to have an inquest to find out more about Mr. Carwell's death.
That's all I know. I'm from police headquarters. I was told to wait
around here, as you were expected, and to serve that on you. Don't
forget to be there. It's a court order,” and the man slunk away.
“An inquest,” murmured Bartlett, as he looked at the paper in his hand.
“I thought they weren't going to have any,” and he glanced quickly at
Colonel Ashley.