A Woman Scorned
“Whoever was searching in Sir Herbert’s room,” Dorcas began, “was after
that recipe for the Binney Buns.”
“What’s that?” asked Zizi, to draw the girl on.
“Why, there’s a special recipe for the buns, of course, and it’s very
valuable,—the buns can’t be made without it,—and I can’t help thinking
that Mr Crippen or some messenger of his has been hunting around there
for that recipe.”
“Why not a messenger from some other of the bakeries interested? The
Popular Popovers, or whatever it’s called,—or Mr Vail’s company?”
“Maybe. But I know that Mr Vail and Sir Herbert decided not to make a
deal, and I think that Popular company also decided not to. Well,
anyway, I’m sure whoever was prowling in the Binney apartment was in
search of that recipe, which was hidden there.”
“Well, but what good does it do to surmise that? Or even to know that?”
“I don’t know, but I thought if Mr Wise knew somebody was hunting there
for a definite purpose, he could find out who the somebody was, and it
might be the murderer.”
“A woman,—or women?”
“No—I suppose not—and yet, why not? A messenger from the bakery
people,—any of them,—of course, _could_ be a woman,—one of the maids,
or some employee of the house.”
“Suppose we go and search.”
“Look here, Miss Everett, you are a sensible girl, and I’m going to
speak frankly. You know that suspicion now is directed toward the aunt
of Mr Bates or——”
“Or my mother! Yes, I do know it, but either supposition is so
ridiculous——”
“Wait a minute; no matter how ridiculous a suspicion may seem to the
people involved, it must be met and denied or it remains. Now, if
suspicion in the two directions mentioned are so absurd, we must prove
their absurdity.”
“How?”
“Either by making it clear that the suspected women could not have been
guilty or, better still, finding the guilty party.”
“Let’s do that, then! I know my mother had no hand in it,—and I’m
equally sure that Miss Prall didn’t——”
“But your surety and your certainty are of no evidential value.”
“That’s why I say let’s find the real women! You are a detective just as
much as Mr Wise is one,—I’m an interested principal, just as much as
Richard Bates is,—can’t we do something big?”
“Good! That’s the talk! We’ll try, at least. Let’s go to the Binney
rooms now, and see what we can see.”
“Small chance of seeing anything in rooms that Mr Wise has already
searched.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Set a woman to catch a woman! If women have sought
and found that recipe, we’ll find their traces. If it’s still there, we
must find the paper ourselves.”
Zizi looked at Dorcas in surprise.
“You’re a trump!” she exclaimed; “good for you! Come along, we’ll see
what we can do.”
The two girls went to the Binney rooms and began their search. But it
seemed useless to look through papers in the desk or books on the book
shelves after Wise and the other detectives had gone over that ground.
“Was Sir Herbert sly and canny?” asked Zizi, thoughtfully.
“Oh, yes, indeed. He was never caught napping. If he hid that paper, he
hid it in a good place. It won’t be found easily. We must think of some
inconspicuous place,—in the back of a picture, or tacked up above the
inside of a drawer.”
“Clever girl!” and Zizi’s admiration increased. “Here goes, then.”
They both looked in all such places as Dorcas had suggested, but with no
success at all.
Wise came in while they were thus busy, and smiled approval at the work
in progress.
“Hello,” he said, suddenly, as Dorcas peered behind a picture that was
hung low, “the wall paper isn’t faded at all in this room. Must be new.”
“It is,” Dorcas told him. “Sir Herbert had this room repapered when he
took the apartment.”
“Why?”
“Said he didn’t like the paper that was on.”
“And yet he could stand that frightful Cubist nightmare on the wall of
the bedroom! H’m! Well, well! Very interesting—ve-ry interesting! See,
Ziz?”
The black eyes of his little assistant sparkled. “Of course I do! He had
the room papered in order to hide his precious recipe.”
“Right! Now, we may have to peel off the paper from the whole room,—for
it’s not probable he kindly left it folded, in order to help us along.”
Dorcas listened with growing surprise. Here was a clever detective,
indeed, to jump to this important conclusion,—if it was the true one.
“Let’s feel around,” Zizi said, and began passing her little brown paw
over the walls.
“Not in plain sight, Ziz,” said Wise, and he started moving out a
bookcase to look behind it.
They felt nothing that seemed like a paper behind the wall paper, but if
the recipe had been placed without folding at all it would doubtless
cause no appreciable extra thickness.
“Maybe he left a memorandum,” suggested Zizi, “or even a cryptogram in
his desk telling where he hid it.”
“Not likely,” said Wise. “You see he wouldn’t forget and he had no
reason to make the thing clear to anybody else.”
“Molly said somebody was in here prowling,” Dorcas reminded, “so
somebody knew there was a paper to look for.”
“But all this paper business presupposes the bread or cake people, and
they aren’t women,” objected Wise.
“That paper about the women may be misleading,” Zizi said, thoughtfully.
“They may have been back of the murder, or, on the other hand, they may
have been the tools of men responsible for the murder.”
“But you can’t get away from women’s connection with the crime. Whether
directly or indirectly guilty, they are the people to look for,—they
are our quarry, and they must be found.”
Dorcas paled and her red lower lip quivered. “Oh, Mr Wise,” she begged,
“do be careful! It would be so awful if you suspected innocent women
just because of the paper! Even granting it is a genuine dying message,
it may mean so many things——”
She broke down and Zizi ran to her and threw her aims around the shaking
form.
“Come, dear,” she said; “you’re all unstrung; don’t look around here any
more now. If there’s a paper to be found, Penny will find it.”
She led Dorcas away and took her back to her own home, and, urging her
to lie down, she soothed the throbbing forehead with her magnetic
finger-tips and soon Dorcas fell asleep.
Zizi tiptoed from the girl’s bedroom, and encountered Mrs Everett on her
way out.
“Do sit down, Miss Zizi,” the lady urged. “I’m pining for some one to
talk to. Tell me now, do you think Letitia Prall is at the back of all
this? Not of course, the actual criminal, but in any way implicated?”
The plump little blonde lady fluttered about and finally settled herself
among some cushions on a couch and turned an inquisitive gaze on her
visitor.
“What would be her motive?” Zizi parried. “To say she did it for young
Bates’ sake sounds poppycock to me.”
“Me, too,” and Mrs Everett smiled. “If she did it, she had a deeper
motive than that! A more disgraceful one.”
“Meaning?”
“Well?—not to put too fine a point upon it,—breach of promise!”
“Was there such a breach?”
“Oh, I’m not saying,—but Letitia certainly wanted to marry Sir
Herbert——”
“Why, I thought he was your admirer——”
“Oh, well,” and the lady bridled, “I’m not saying anything about
that—but if he did admire me, that doesn’t mean I smiled on him. I’m no
husband hunter,—and poor Letitia is and always has been—without
success, poor thing!”
“And it went as far as an engagement?”
“I only surmise that from what Miss Prall has hinted—not, I must say,
from anything poor Sir Herbert said! But you know what old maids
are——”
“How comes it that, while you and Miss Prall are at such odds, you have
the same admirers? I’m told Mr Crippen is a beau of both.”
Zizi sensed the widow’s willingness to exploit her conquests and
utilized the knowledge.
“Oh, he didn’t care for Letitia! He was rather polite to me, but I had
to discourage him. One can’t be too careful. And if you give a man a
kindly smile, he thinks he may presume on it.”
“Was Sir Herbert like that?”
“Yes, indeed! Although he was Richard’s uncle, he was no kin to
Richard’s aunt Letitia, and he didn’t hesitate to tell me how little he
admired that Grenadier type of woman.”
“Preferring more feminine natures?”
“Yes,” Mrs Everett preened herself. “How you do understand, Miss Zizi! I
expect you’re a heart-breaker yourself.”
“Oh, rather!” and Zizi’s big dark eyes rolled roguishly. “But I say, Mrs
Everett, if this breach of promise case is a true bill, it’s a straw to
show which way the wind might have blown,—at least.”
“Well, don’t quote me,—but I do know Letitia Prall’s nature and you
know it’s said, ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.’”
Zizi faced her squarely and with a sharp look said, “You know, Mrs
Everett, you’re making a very grave accusation. Do you really think Miss
Prall is——”
“Yes, I do! That man was killed. He said women did it. There are no
women sufficiently interested in his death to be suspected of it except
Letitia and Eliza Gurney. So, much as I hate to think so dreadfully of
any woman, I’ve no choice but to suspect them. Of course, it’s a grave
accusation, but you asked me and it’s my duty to say what I think.”
From all this Zizi gleaned one bit of satisfaction. She felt positive
that Mrs Everett herself was innocent. She had never really suspected
the little widow but her name had been mentioned as a possible suspect,
and Zizi wondered. Now, she decided that, whatever might be true about
Letitia Prall, Mrs Everett could not, were she guilty herself, talk the
way she did about her enemy. Not so much the accusation as the way it
was said. Had Mrs Everett killed the man, or assisted or directed the
murder, she would have shown fear, secretiveness, or at least a harassed
demeanor. Instead of which, she had apparently no interest in the matter
save a vindictive desire to see her enemy in the clutches of the law.
Anyway, thought Zizi, I cross her off from my list of suspects, and now
for the Prall side of the story.
Leaving the Everett apartment Zizi went up the stairs to the eighth
floor, and though she was headed for Letitia Prall’s, she paused at the
Binney rooms.
“Come in,” called Wise, as the sleek black little head peeped in at the
door; “I’ve struck it!”
“Where?” asked Zizi, intuitively knowing that he had found the hiding
place of the paper.
“Here,” and Wise drew her attention to a fairly large mirror that was
above the mantel in the sitting-room.
“Why, that thing was screwed fast,” the girl said, “and we couldn’t move
it.”
“I unscrewed it—and, behold.”
Loosening the screws, which he had only partially readjusted, Wise
lifted down the mirror, and disclosed a rectangular space where the wall
paper had been cut away.
“The bakery men!” Zizi cried. “Why ‘women,’ then?”
“Now, look here, Ziz,” and Wise replaced the mirror, “get it in your
head that women may have been interested in getting this recipe. To
suppose a woman may have been acting for a man, while possible, is not
probable.”
“Why not? Suppose a woman, say a working girl, so devoted to a man that
she’d commit murder at his bidding——”
“No man could be such a coward as that!”
“Oh, Penny, what an exalted opinion you have of your sex! Of course he
could! A man who would murder would use a woman to help him murder. Of
course he offered a big inducement,—marriage maybe——”
“You’re romancing——”
“No, I’m not; I’m reconstructing. I see a man wanting that recipe
desperately. He sets a woman to get it. He may not have meant her to go
to such lengths as murder, to get it, but——”
“All right, but stick to facts. The recipe has been stolen by someone in
the know. Some one who realized why Sir Herbert had his room
repapered——”
“Clever trick, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, but unnecessary. He could have put the thing in safe deposit.”
“Englishmen are queer that way. And he may have distrusted our American
institutions——”
“Well, anyway, there’s no doubt he did hide the paper behind the new
wallpaper, and there’s no doubt somebody has stolen it. I suppose you
agree to that?”
“Yea, my lord! But it may have been taken after the murder.”
“Of course it was. Why kill the man, else?”
“Why kill him at all?”
“To get him out of the way, in order to get the recipe and manufacture
the buns.”
“For whom?”
“That’s just it. There are several bakeries interested,—others beside
the principal ones, of which we know. Now we must find out which baker
could have worked his deadly scheme through women.”
“Does this let out the Prall or Everett suspects?”
“To my mind, yes. But I never suspected them, anyway.”
“Nor I. And I’ve exonerated Mrs Everett to my satisfaction, and I’m
going to find out for sure about the Grenadier. Now, there’s that
Molly,——”
“Yes, she’s in it, up to the neck, I believe. And she’s such a liar——”
“Oh, Penny, you can’t let a lady liar fool you, can you? Get her up
here, and put her through an inquisition. _I’ll_ tell you if she’s
telling truth or not.”
“Yes, you’re first class at that.”
Molly was summoned and when she appeared Zizi saw at once something had
happened. The girl’s demeanor was entirely changed. She was more
self-important and self-assertive, and Zizi wondered if she had learned
something definite against some suspect.
“Molly,” began Wise, “we’ve found that some one has been—prowling round
in here, just as you said,—and you are to tell us who it was.”
“That I don’t know, sir,” the girl replied, speaking with a flippancy
that was careless and almost impertinent.
“Then tell us all you do know. Was it a man or a woman?”
“A woman, sir.”
“Why, Molly!” Zizi cried, “you told me it was a man, and that he was up
to no good. Those were your very words.”
“Oh, no, you don’t remember correctly. I said it was a woman.”
“That is an untruth,” Zizi stated, calmly. “So, now we know you are
telling us falsehoods, we must find out why. Has some one paid you for
it? We will pay you more for the truth. Might as well, Penny. This girl
only sells her statements, true or false.”
“All right, Molly. But we only want to buy the true ones. Now, what’ll
you take for all you really know about the matter, and guarantee to be
the strict truth?”
“I don’t want any pay. And the truth is that the person I saw was a
lady—I mean a woman.”
“Care to mention names?”
“I don’t know who it was. I just saw a veiled figure——”
“Cut out the veiled figure!” cried Zizi. “You’re making it up. There
never was any veiled figure,—you saw a man hunting around here, while
you were hidden in the bathroom. You know he was looking for something
of value hidden in these rooms. And——” Zizi’s black eyes fairly seemed
to bore into Molly’s own as she went on, “you know he got it. Also, you
know who the man was,—and you won’t tell, and you say it was a woman,
because—because what, Molly?”
“I don’t—I mean——” Molly blushed scarlet and dropped her eyes; then,
with a revived bravado she cried, “It _was_ a woman,—I tell you it was
a woman!”
“Stop lying!” said Zizi sternly, “she’s doing that, Pen, because the man
she saw has ordered her to.”
“No, he hasn’t,” Molly declared, but Zizi said:
“Yes, he has, and what’s more, he has bribed you by——”
Zizi’s penetrating glance overcame Molly’s boldness and she trembled in
silence as Zizi said, “by marriage!”
Even Wise looked up in amazement; “What _do_ you mean, Zizi?”
“Just what I say. Molly is wearing a very bright, new wedding ring. She
didn’t have it yesterday. Molly knows the truth we’re looking for, and
she won’t tell because it implicates a man who has married her to keep
her quiet! Is it Bob Moore, Molly.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said the girl, in a low tone, and with a very apparent
look of relief.
“Then it isn’t,” said Zizi triumphantly; “I know by the way you speak!
Who is it?”
“It isn’t anybody,” Molly said, but she said it with a furtive glance at
their faces in turn; with a hesitating air of uncertainty as to what
course to take; with a futile attempt at her old impudent manner. “I’m
not really married; lots of us girls wear a wedding ring to fool
people.”
“Rubbish!” said Zizi, contemptuously. “There’s no sense in that! You are
married,—or, you think you are—aha, I thought so!”
For Molly’s scared glance betokened that Zizi had struck on the truth.
Quite evidently she was apprehensive lest the aspersion should prove a
correct one. “He married you in an extremity of fear,—fear that you
would tell of his visit to the room,—now, who could it be, Penny? It’s
easy enough to judge if we guess right,—but I can’t think of any one.
It must be some employe of the house,—or——”
“Or some tool of some of the bakery people,” said Wise.
“Look higher,” jeered Molly, her self-confidence returning, as she
realized their uncertainty.
“Good heavens!” cried Zizi, “you can’t mean Richard Bates!”
“Yep,” said Molly, and her eyes danced with a wicked glee.
“Oh, incredible!” wailed Zizi. “Yet I’ve been afraid of him all along.
You see, he’s shielding his aunt. I’m sure Miss Prall is——”
“You said you didn’t believe her guilty,” spoke up Wise.
“I know I did, but what other way can we turn? It can’t be any less
important person who married Molly to shut her up. There can’t be any
reason that would make Bates do so, but to shield his aunt from
suspicion. Molly says now it was a woman searching the room,—of course,
she didn’t want the recipe,—that’s a side issue; she wanted some
letters or something in connection with the breach of promise——”
“Come, come, Zizi, you can’t take that little yellow-topped widow’s yarn
of a breach of promise too seriously——”
“Why not? She is innocent herself, I know. She suspects Miss Prall, I
know. She gave a perfectly good motive,—why, Pen, if women killed that
man where’s another motive that can hold a candle to the ‘woman scorned’
idea? Come, Molly, own up; was it Miss Prall searching the room?”
“Oh, no, miss!” and Molly’s eyes bulged with such real surprise that
there was no doubting her sincerity this time.
“But how could you tell, if the figure was a veiled one?” asked Wise.
“Oh, I could tell it wasn’t Miss Prall,—gracious, no!”
“What was the—the person looking for,—I mean where was the search
made?”
“All around.”
“In the desk?”
“Yes, and in the table drawers and the
cupboards,—and—and—everywhere.” Molly waved a vague hand about the
room.
“And behind the mirror?” Wise sprang this at her suddenly.
The girl’s face blanched. “How—what made you think of that?” she
gasped, her voice quaking with fear.
“Ah, that brings back the picture, does it? You saw the—the person,
hunting about; you saw him go to the mirror, gaze at it thoughtfully,
then unscrew it, and then—then he succeeded in his search? Eh?”
“Yes,” Molly breathed, fairly hypnotized into the truth by Wise’s
suggestive air and tense, compelling voice.