BASSETT was prepared for what he had to tell. During the long wait for
the officers of the law his mind had been ranging over it, shaking
bare from unnecessary detail the chain of events that had ended in
murder. It was impossible to conceal the situation between Sybil and
the Stokeses; he could not if he had wished it and he did not wish
it. A girl had been brutally done to death, a girl innocent of any
evil intention, and his desire to bring her murderer to justice was
as strong as either Williams’ or Rawson’s. And they could get the
facts better from him than from the muddled stories of the others,
their minds clouded by prejudice and hearsay. He hoped that what he
said would be coldly unbiased, the naked truth as he knew it. That his
revelations would involve a woman whom he liked and pitied would not
induce him to withhold what ought to be known. Chivalry had no place
in this grim drama. As he had discharged his duties as director of a
theatrical company rent by passions and dissensions, he now prepared to
discharge them as the most responsible and fair-minded member of the
group.
Sitting by the desk in the library he unveiled the situation, what he
had heard, seen and knew. The men gave an unwinking attention, now and
then stopping him to plant a question. The trend of Williams’ thoughts
was soon revealed--he suspected Flora Stokes. When the matter was
threshed out he came to an open admission with the remark:
“Well, you have only one person here who had the provocation necessary
to commit murder.”
Bassett made no answer. If his duty required him to tell all he knew,
it did not require him to give his own opinions.
Rawson who was smoking, his long, loose-jointed frame slouched down in
an armchair, took his cigar from his mouth:
“Of course the woman’s the first person you’d think of. She had the
necessary provocation and the state of mind. But the way she came in
and told them--as Mr. Bassett describes it--doesn’t look to me like a
guilty person.”
“Why not?”
“Sounds too genuine, too like real excitement.”
“Don’t you think it’s natural to get excited if you’ve killed some one?”
“Yes, but not just that way.”
Williams leaned over the arm of his chair:
“You got to remember something about these people, Rawson--and it
counts big--they’re all actors.”
Bassett spoke up quickly:
“No, she wasn’t acting. You’d have known that if you’d seen her. What
she did was natural--a woman suffering from a fearful shock.”
“Couldn’t an actor put that on?”
“Yes, some could, but I’m certain she wasn’t.”
“When Stokes came into the room after the shot,” said Rawson, “how did
he behave?”
“He seemed all right. But I can’t honestly say that I noticed him much.
The light was fading and I was so irritated by the thought that some
one had been shooting that I didn’t pay any attention to him.”
“Oh, rubbish!” Williams made a rolling motion in the scoop of the big
chair. “You can’t suspect the man; he was in love with her. He didn’t
want to kill her, he wanted to keep her alive.”
“Men _do_ kill the women they love, especially when they can’t get her.”
“Yes, they do. I’ve known of such cases. But that’s impulse. This was
premeditated.” The sheriff pointed at the revolver lying on the desk.
“Sometime to-day somebody located that gun, took it for a purpose--not
to shoot sea-gulls as you thought, Mr. Bassett.”
Rawson looked at the pistol:
“Premeditation, all right. Was there anybody in the outfit who didn’t
know you’d opened that drawer and found the revolver gone?”
Bassett considered:
“Stokes didn’t know. He came in after I’d shut the drawer. I didn’t
speak of it because just as I’d got through asking him if he’d seen any
one, we heard Mrs. Stokes’ scream.”
“And _she_ didn’t, of course,” commented Williams.
“While you were running round at the Point the house was empty?”
“I think Mrs. Stokes was here all the time. I never saw her outside.”
“Any of the others come up?”
“I’m not certain of all of them. I know Shine did; I sent him back to
phone over to Hayworth for the boats. And Stokes did, he came up for
the electric torch when I was in here telephoning to you.”
“Then neither of them knew the loss of the revolver had been discovered
and they had plenty of opportunity to return it to the desk?”
Bassett nodded, and after a minute’s cogitation Rawson went on:
“Doesn’t it seem odd to you that no one saw Miss Saunders when she came
back to the house?”
“No. They were all in their rooms, except Shine who was down at the
Point and Mrs. Stokes who was reading on the balcony. I asked her
particularly if she’d noticed Sybil pass and she said no, she’d been
interested in her book and wouldn’t have noticed anybody.”
“I’d give a good deal to know what Miss Saunders did in that time. I
think it would let in some light.”
“How so?”
Rawson narrowed his eyes in contemplation of an unfolding line of
thought:
“Well, what took her out again to the Point after she’d come in? She
hadn’t a good deal of time and she wanted to change her clothes before
supper. It looks to me as if she met some one in the house, some one
who wanted her to go down there with them.”
“Mrs. Cornell says she was alone.”
“She might have started alone and gone to meet them.”
“Then it couldn’t have been Stokes,” said Williams, “for Mr. Bassett
says she wouldn’t speak to him if she could help it.”
“That’s right,” Bassett nodded in agreement. “She’d never have made a
date with him. She shunned him like the plague. If you knew her you
wouldn’t see anything in that going out. She was restless and unhappy
and the place here--the sea, the views--fascinated her. It was our last
evening and it was like her not to want to miss any of it, slip out for
a minute to enjoy the end of it.”
“And came upon some one waiting for her--lying in wait and----”
Rawson did not finish. A thud and crackling crash came from the
living-room. The three men rose with a simultaneous leap and ran for
the door.
X
OF ALL the people gathered in the house that evening Anne had been the
most silent. Her ravaged face, the contours broken by gray hollows,
bearing the stamp of shock and horror, had been unnoticed among the
other faces. Now and then a pitying glance had been directed to her,
grief as Sybil’s friend must have added a last unbearable poignancy to
the tragedy.
After her question to Flora her mind had seemed to blur and cease to
function. She had run from the house not knowing what she did, gone
hither and thither with the others, looking, speaking, listening in
a blind daze. It was not till they returned to the living-room that
her faculties began to clear and coordinate. The lights, the familiar
setting, the talk that could not leave the subject, shook her back to
reality. It was then that she went to the window and sat with her back
to the room. She wanted no one to see her face; she was afraid of what
it might betray.
Her thoughts circled round the image of Joe as she had last seen
him--the vision of him as some one strange and sinister. And the
boat--the boat with only Gabriel in it--it kept coming up like a
picture revolving on a wheel--going and returning, going and returning.
Had he stayed and what for? That question revolved with the picture of
the boat. She could not get free of them, their obsessing force held
her like a somnambulist staring into the night.
She thought of telling Bassett and gave that up--with the police
expected she could not get him alone, and why add to his burden with
her suspicions? Yes, that was what it was--nothing but a suspicion.
She had no certainty, Joe might have been in the boat, Joe might have
got off the island some other way. To-morrow something might come to
light that would make these hideous fancies seem like the dreams of
delirium. That was the state of mind she tried to maintain when she
went up-stairs and overheard a man was on guard at the causeway.
With that knowledge her outlook changed. Her passive rôle was over. She
sat down on the side of the bed and with a grim desperate resolution
faced what she had tried to flee.
If Joe had done it and if he was on the island he would try to get
off at low tide. It was safe to assume that he was outside, hidden
till the causeway was open. To go out to find him would be useless,
he would never reveal himself to her, and if she was seen suspicion
would instantly be aroused. She must get somewhere that would command
the causeway and its approaches. Her mind ran over every nook and
angle, every shadow and rock ledge between the house and the shore.
Impossible--it was too open and the light was like day. The best
place--the only place--was the living-room entrance. From there she
could see in all directions, the balcony end, the kitchen wing, the
pine grove. She would try to wave him back, possibly get to him--she
had to take her chances and trust to Heaven.
And then he might never come--it might be just an awful nightmare and
he was with Jimmy Travers on his way to the northern woods. She dropped
her face in her hands and sent up broken words of pleading that it
might be so.
The tide was at full ebb at midnight. At a quarter before she made
ready. She took from the bureau a book she had been reading--if she
met any one she could say she had come down to find it--and opened
her door with the stealth of a burglar. A dead silence reigned as she
stole down the stairs and into the living-room. Here the great line of
windows--the moon not yet upon them--shone in gray oblongs diffusing a
spectral light that did not touch the darkness under the galleries.
At the entrance, pressed against the door, she looked out. It was a
world of white enchantment, breathlessly still. She could see the
patterned surfaces of leaves, the cracks and fissures of the rocks.
Below the channel lay almost bare, pools glistening like dropped
mirrors, mounds of mud casting inky shadows. In the middle--a restless
silvery sparkle--ran a narrow stream carrying a glinting line of
radiance to the ocean beyond. The pungent smell of mud and seaweed came
from it along with the sleepy lisp of rippling water.
She could hear the murmur of the men’s voices from the open library
windows, and like the throbbing of a muffled engine, the beating of her
own heart.
Into that deep enveloping quietude came a sound, so faint, so
infinitely small and hushed, that only expectant ears could have
caught it. It came from the room behind her, and turning, she slid
back against the wall, her body black against its blackness. The
sound continued, the opening of a door opposite, the door into the
kitchen wing. It seemed no door in the world had ever opened so
slowly--creaking, stopping, resuming, dying away. She could see
nothing, for the darkness of the gallery lay impenetrable over that
furtive entrance.
There was a footstep, light as the fall of a leaf, and she saw him
coming toward her in that high luminous pallor from the windows. He was
like a shadow, so evenly dark, a shape without detail, moving with a
shadow’s noiseless passage. She saw the outline of the cap on his head
and that he carried his shoes in one hand.
She came forward with a hand raised for caution, sending her voice
before her in an agonized whisper:
“Go back, Joe. The causeway’s watched. You can’t get over that way.
_Go!_”
He was gone, a fleet flying, vanishing back into the darkness under the
gallery. Out of it came the soft closing of the door.
The room swayed, pale light and darkness swam and coalesced. She knew
she was near a table and put out her hand to steady herself by it,
something solid to hold to for one minute. The polished surface slid
under her fingers and she groped out with the hand that held the book.
The book slipped from her clasp, fell with a thud like a thunderclap,
and a grasping snatch to save it swept a lamp crashing to the floor.
Panic dispelled her faintness and she made a rush for the door. She had
gained it. Her fingers clutched round the knob, as she heard the steps
of the men in the hall and knew it was too late to escape.
They burst in, thrust into the room’s dim quiet as if shot by a blast.
“It’s nothing,” she called, hearing her voice thin and hoarse.
“Nothing’s happened. It’s only Anne Tracy.”
The lights leaped out and she saw them, Bassett with his hand on the
electric button, stricken still, looking this way and that. His eye
found her first, backed against the door, a small green-clad figure
with an ashen face.
“What’s this mean?” said Rawson.
“Nothing.” She was afraid the handle would rattle with the shaking of
her hand so let it go. “I upset the lamp in the dark. I didn’t see it
that’s all.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I came down to get my book. I forgot and left it when I went
up-stairs.”
She could get her breath now and her voice was under control. She felt
strength oozing back into her body and with it courage.
“You’re as white as a sheet,” Williams blurted out.
“Did something frighten you?” demanded Bassett.
“No, but a sort of faintness came over me, there by the table, and I
grabbed at it and upset the lamp.”
Rawson looked at the table with the shattered fragments of the lamp
beside it. It was not far from the entrance door.
“Did you see anything--anything outside?”
“No, not a thing and I didn’t hear a sound.”
“What do you suppose made you feel faint?”
“Oh!” She dared to make a gesture, upraised hands that dropped limply.
“Hasn’t there been enough here to make anybody faint?”
“You’ve got to remember, Rawson,” said Bassett who thought the man’s
insistence unnecessary, “what a shock this has been--especially to Miss
Tracy who was Miss Saunders’ friend.”
“I remember.” Then to Anne: “Miss Tracy, if you should withhold any
information from us you’d get yourself into a very uncomfortable
position.”
“I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t,” she breathed.
Rawson’s glance remained on her, dubiously intent. Bassett noted it
with a resentment he found it difficult to hide.
“You can absolutely rely on Miss Tracy,” he said. “She would be
perfectly frank with you if she had anything to tell.”
“No doubt, no doubt,” said the other, and walked to the entrance. “I’m
going out to have a look around.” On the sill he turned and addressed
Anne. “I gave some instructions to you ladies and I expected to have
them followed. You’ll please remember them in the future.”
He passed out into the brilliancy of the moonlight. Now that he was
gone Bassett felt he must make her understand. He had been astonished
at what she had done. It was so unlike her, a disobedience of orders at
such a time as this.
“You must do what they tell you, Anne. They have to make these rules
and it’s up to us to keep them.”
“I will now. You can trust me. Mr. Williams, you can see how it was. I
couldn’t sleep and my mind was full of this awful thing, and I thought
if I could put it on something else--get free from my thoughts even for
a few minutes!”
Williams grunted his comprehension. He felt rather tenderly toward her,
she looked so small and wan and her voice was so pleading.
“Where was your book?” he asked.
“On the table behind you. I was feeling round for it and I think I
pushed it off with the lamp.”
“What was the name of it?”
“_Victory_, by Joseph Conrad.”
He went to the table. His back turned, she and Bassett exchanged a long
look. Williams picked up the book and came back with it.
“Here it is,” he said, giving it to her. “And just make a note of the
fact that you’re not to go round the house at night after books or
anything else.”
She assured him she would not, she would give them no more trouble,
and opening the door she slipped away. They remained without speaking
till she came out on the gallery and walked to her room. Bassett stood
looking up after she had disappeared, the memory of her face as they
burst in upon her added a new peculiar distress to his harrowed state.
“Well,” said Williams, “her book _was_ there.”
Bassett stared at him:
“_Was_ there! Why shouldn’t it be?”
Williams gave an upward hitch of his shoulders:
“Words come easy, Mr. Bassett.”
“Good God!” exclaimed Bassett in horrified amaze. “You have any idea
she was _lying_? If you have, get it out of your head. I’ve known Miss
Tracy for three years and she could no more say what wasn’t true
than--well, she _couldn’t_, that’s all.”
“I don’t think she did. It sounded to me a perfectly straight story.”
“It was. You can take my word for that.”
They were back in the library when Rawson reappeared with Shine. Shine,
unable to sleep, had been sitting by his window when Rawson, scouting,
had stopped to inquire if he had seen any one. Shine had not, but had
volunteered to join in a hunt and the two had been about the house and
the immediate vicinity. Nothing had been discovered and Patrick had
seen no sign of life or heard no sound. Now they had come back for
the electric torch and were going to extend their search. A person
concealed on the seaward side of the island might be moving at this
hour when the causeway was free. Bassett said he would go with them and
the three men left the room by one of the long windows.
Williams opened the library door and turned off the lights. The noise
of the departing trio would suggest to any one on the watch that the
house was free of police supervision and there might be developments.
He took the desk chair as easier to rise from than the deep-seated
leather ones and settled himself to a _resumé_ of what they had so far
gathered.
He was convinced of Mrs. Stokes’ guilt and ran over the reasons. A
hysterical woman, frantic with jealousy--that alone was enough. But
that woman had been the only member of the party who at the time of
the shooting had been some distance from the house. She had taken the
pistol with the intention of using it if an occasion offered. Her walk
had been undertaken with the hope that she might find that occasion
in the hour before supper when they were all in their rooms. The
occasion _had_ offered. Miss Saunders, unable to resist the beauty of
the evening, had gone to the Point alone. He set no store by Rawson’s
opinion that the woman’s state of mind was too genuinely distracted.
He considered it as part of a premeditated plan carried through with
nerve and skill. She would have known that the report of the pistol
would have been heard at the house. This, when Miss Saunders did not
return, would have suggested foul play. And she, Mrs. Stokes, was the
only person out on the island. A later entrance, with an assumption of
ignorance, would have turned suspicion on her like a pointing finger.
She was too intelligent for that--had called her abilities as an
actress to her aid and put them all off with her screaming excitement.
Another point that he wanted to look into was the length of time she
had been at the shore after the report--a great deal too long for what
she said she had done. Too paralyzed to think or move, her explanation
was stunned. Williams was divided in his opinion as to that--either
pulling herself together for the grand-stand play she was to make or
possibly pushing the body into the water.
It was at this juncture that he suddenly cocked his head and let his
hands drop softly to the arms of the chair. From the stairs outside
came a faint creak, a pause and then again, step by step a bare or
stockinged foot in gradual descent.
The big man arose as noiselessly as he could and made for the hall. But
his bulk and his boots were not adapted to rapid movements or silent
surprise. As he reached the hall he heard the pattering flight of light
feet and cursed under his breath as he felt for the electric button.
Her room--the one he had seen Miss Pinkney put her in--was just beyond
the stair-head to the right. And her husband’s--he turned and faced the
secretive panels of its closed door.
Williams dropped his head and trod thoughtfully back to the library,
but this time he left the hall lights on. Also he lit the library ones
and allowed himself the solace of a cigar. “She won’t try that again
to-night,” he said to himself and dropped into an easy chair.
Then Stokes must know. They had had opportunity for private conference
in that hour after the murder when the others were out of the house.
She had either told him or he had accused her; for all they knew he
might have seen her do it. Anyway she wanted to get speech with him and
it might be support, counsel, the matching up of their stories--but
whatever it was she must have been in dire straights to take such a
risk.
Williams smoked on, comfortably sprawled in the deep chair, thinking
out a line of attack on the Stokeses.