THREE TIMES RUNNING.
Shagarach's office was a hive of industry the next time Emily Barlow
called. Walter Riley, installed in Jacob's place, looked smartly
clerical, with a pen over one ear, docketing some papers, and Aronson
was knitting his brows over a decision in the digest. But the lawyer
himself, she thought, did not appear to have profited greatly by his
fortnight's vacation. His cheek was worn and his manner betrayed an
unusual aberration at times.
He had returned only the evening before. When she entered the parlor to
greet him his mother found the padlock chain of the Persian poets torn
through their edges, and her son face down on the carpet buried in a
volume of Hafiz, with Sadi and Firdusi scattered near. She trembled, but
she did not disturb him.
"Our cause progresses," he said, in answer to Emily's query. "Important
links have been discovered since we last conferred."
The sweet girl lifted her eyebrows and waited.
"In the first place we shall put Harry Arnold on the stand. I have
traced him to the door of the study a moment before the fire was set."
Emily bit her lip just a trifle in disappointment, for her own cherished
theory would only be embarrassed by the presence of Harry Arnold there.
"The other points?" she asked.
"You remember the peddler in the green cart, alluded to in Ellen
Greeley's letter, who carried messages to some person unknown?"
"Perfectly."
"Three witnesses stand ready to swear that a peddler in a green cart
cried his wares through the roads of Woodlawn about the time of the fire
and frequently stopped at the house of the Arnolds."
"That connects them legally," said Emily, still more discontented. "How
soon do you expect a trial?"
"In less than two weeks. I am sorry you will have to shorten your
vacation."
"Oh, it is better over; the suspense is agony."
"The door, Walter," said Shagarach, as she passed out. Pretty soon he
went home to his own midday meal. Aronson was called away to look up a
title and left the Whistler in charge.
Walter had already caught just a little of his employer's decision of
manner, which sat oddly on his rosy face, but was no more, after all,
than a laudable aspiration toward manfulness. The lawyer had discovered
his skill with the pencil and his mechanical interests, and had set him
to work evenings copying the designs in a drawing manual. Meanwhile, his
gamesome impulses had quieted a good deal, and it was only when the
office was empty, as now, that the old rich whistle was heard. Shagarach
and Shagarach's suggestions seemed to consume that whole fund of
adolescent energy which formerly had overleaped all bounds in its search
for an outlet.
He was just in the middle of a skylark solo, interrupted by bites at the
contents of his lunch-box, when a white-bearded old man entered. At
first Walter, hearing the limp on the stairs, took it for old Diebold,
the pensioner, one of Shagarach's clients. The lunch-box vanished like
magic and there was a hasty brushing of crumbs and swallowing of a
half-masticated mouthful before he turned the knob.
"Is Mr. Shagarach in?" asked the stranger, glancing around with a senile
leer.
"Not now, sir, but I expect him soon," answered Walter. "He's gone to
dinner. Won't you be seated while you wait for him?"
"How long?" said the old man, mumbling his words, as if he were
toothless, and nodding at the boy over and over again.
"How long before he comes back? Oh, he never stays away long. He'll be
here in five minutes, I guess."
The old man sat down feebly in the chair. Such a strange old man,
thought Walter. His white beard almost covering his face and reaching
down on his bosom, and long white curls coming out from under his hat.
He must be almost a hundred, said the boy to himself. Yet his eyes
rolled around quickly and his skin wasn't wrinkled at the corners of the
eyes, nor did he have those time-scored furrows in the neck that
soldiers call saber cuts.
"Buy a pencil," he said to Walter, taking out a bunch from his pocket.
Walter shook his head in some disappointment. It was only a peddler,
after all.
"Two for five," persisted the visitor.
Should he show him the door? Mr. Shagarach did not like to be troubled
with peddlers, but this one was so very old. Walter hesitated about
dismissing him. Besides he had asked for the lawyer. Perhaps he had some
business, too.
Just then Shagarach's brisk step was heard in the entry, and the little
man came flying across the room to his desk in the inner office.
"That is Mr. Shagarach?" asked the gray-beard, jerking his thumb and
leering again.
"Walter," said Shagarach. Walter jumped and was preceding the visitor in
when a terrible snarl of rage caused him to turn. The white-bearded old
man seemed to have been transformed into a beast, glaring with his wild
blue eyes and gritting his great teeth at Shagarach. He raised a bottle
in his hand and hurled its contents at the lawyer. But Walter had caught
his arm and pulled it down with all the might in his bourgeoning
muscles. The liquor hissed where it fell, and several drops spattered on
his neck and bosom, causing him to shrink as if touched with a caustic.
Still he tore at the old man's face, and covered the mouth of the bottle
with his palm so as to intercept the hot shower.
Shagarach had been looking down at some papers when he first heard the
sound of the old man's breath forced between his teeth. As quick as
thought he reached for the paper-weight and hurled it with all his
force. It struck the stranger full in the forehead, cutting a ragged
gash with its edge. Then the lawyer sprung from his chair, following up
his missile with the quickness of a cat. But just as he reached across
Walter's body the boy fell back in his arms with a shriek of pain, the
stranger's white beard coming away in his fingers.
"The oaf!" cried Shagarach, but the assailant was gone in a flash.
"Water! Water!" shrieked the office boy, writhing in his arms.
The lawyer glanced around. The wainscoting was charred where the liquor
had fallen. The boy's jacket was eaten away in holes. It was vitriol
that had been thrown.
"A quart of lime-water at the nearest apothecary's," he shouted to
Aronson, who had just come back. "And the first physician you can fetch.
Don't lose a second."
Aronson was off like the wind, while Shagarach unbuttoned the boy's vest
and tore away the saturated portions of his undergarments that were
clinging to his shriveled skin. Already great blisters rose under the
action of the acid.
"Will you telephone central 431, Inspector McCausland," he said to the
tenant opposite who had been attracted in by the noise. "Ask him to call
at once, and state that I have been attacked again."
It was the physician who arrived first, then Aronson. Walter's burns
were bathed profusely with the lime-water, and the blisters pricked open
by the doctor's needle. After the first agony he bore the pain without a
groan. His breast and palm would be scarred for life, but the only wound
on the visible parts was a long, pear-shaped corrosion extending along
the side of his neck. You may imagine how tenderly Shagarach nursed him
and how excitedly Aronson ran to and fro fetching whatever was asked
for.
"It is time this should be stopped," said McCausland, entering. But he
was not alone. He held a great bloodhound in leash. "It was the same
customer, I suppose? Can you give me any article belonging to the man? I
picked up this in the doorway."
He held up a white wig.
"The false beard," cried Walter, holding it out from the stretcher on
which they were bundling him.
"Better the blood drops," said Shagarach. "Search the stairs. He was
wounded."
McCausland rushed out, his hound tugging strongly at the leash.
"Smell, Wolf, smell," they could hear him saying, and then a half-trip
and a clatter down the stairs told that the dog had caught the scent and
nearly pulled the inspector off his feet.
"I am glad it is no worse, Walter. The doctor will do all that skill can
to soothe your pain. You have saved my life twice," said Shagarach,
pressing the boy's hands, which were clasped over his bosom, where the
lint lay on his burns. Gently the ambulance men carried him down the
stairs, with never a cry from his brave lips tightened over the sound.
"I will call to-night, Walter. May you be better then," said the lawyer,
giving the driver Mrs. Riley's address. The physician climbed into the
spare seat and the wagon drove off with its suffering passenger.
"A cap, a coat button and a false beard," said Shagarach. "And still we
grope in the dark. Yet an anatomist will reconstruct a mastodon from a
fragment of his tooth!"
"Lost again," said McCausland, re-entering with his bloodhound, which
nosed about in corners of the room. The inspector sat down, puffing and
looked thoroughly disgusted.
"You lost the trail?"
"Never fear Wolf for that. Lie down, Wolf! No; the hound kept his track
through all the cross-scents of the city--something to boast of,
that--there was blood dripping here and there, that I knew by his
yelping. By the way, you must have struck him hard."
"The paper-weight is heavy," said Shagarach, picking it up from under
the desk where it had rolled. As he did so the hound gave a roar and a
bound, and stood up to reach it with his forepaws.
"Down, Wolf! Lie down!" cried McCausland, sternly. "There is blood on
the edge. That may help us another time."
"Take it," said Shagarach. "But you lost the trail, you said."
"It vanished into the air. Wolf took us to the northern station, running
me off my feet all the way--through the waiting-room, up and down the
platform twice, inside track gate No. 5, and then--flatted fair and
square. You know the random way he runs about when he's lost the scent?
Our man had taken a train."
"The western express, 12:59," said Shagarach.
"How did you know?"
"I have had occasion to take the same train at track No. 5 on a visit to
Woodlawn. Had he purchased a ticket?"
"No man with a cut on his face, or of our description."
"Then he has a trip ticket and lives there."
"Where?"
"At Woodlawn," said the lawyer. "Near Harry Arnold."
McCausland smiled incredulously.
"Is Woodlawn the only station between here and Albany?" he asked.
"However, I telegraphed along the route to have the runaway stopped."
"What time did you send the telegram?" asked Shagarach.
"At 1:19 by the station clock."
"Just a minute too late. The express reaches Woodlawn at 1:18. It is the
first station."
"Heigho! Here's a to-do. What about Woodlawn?" asked a cheerful voice.
It was Dr. Jonas Silsby, brown as a berry, with a broad-brimmed straw
hat and a basketful of botanical specimens under one arm. The casual
observer would have taken him for an uncommonly good-looking farmer,
bringing some choice greens to market.