BOOK III

THE HOUSE OF DOOM

XIX.

IN TAMPA

When I started on this desperate search after a witness, war had been

declared, but no advance as yet ordered on Cuba. But during my journey

south the long expected event happened, and on my arrival in Tampa I

found myself in the midst of departure and everything in confusion.

Of course, under such conditions it was difficult to find my man on the

instant. Innumerable inquiries yielded no result, and in the absence of

any one who would or could give me the desired information I wandered

from one end of the camp to the other till I finally encountered a

petty officer who gave signs of being a Rough Rider. Him I stopped,

and, with some hint of my business, asked where James Calvert could be

found.

His answer was a stare and a gesture toward the hospital tents.

Nothing could have astonished me more.

“Sick?” I cried.

“Dying,” was his answer.

Dying! Curly Jim! Impossible. I had misled my informant as to the exact

man I wanted, or else there were two James Calverts in Tampa. Curly

Jim, the former cowboy, was not the fellow to succumb in camp before he

had ever smelt powder.

“It is James Calvert of the First Volunteer Corps I am after,” said I.

“A sturdy fellow—”

“No doubt, no doubt. Many sturdy fellows are down. He’s down to stay.

Typhoid, you know. Bad case. No hope from the start. Pity, but—”

I heard no more. Dying! Curly Jim. He who was considered to be immune!

He who held the secret—

“Let me see him,” I demanded. “It is important—a police matter—a word

from him may save a life. He is still breathing?”

“Yes, but I do not think there is any chance of his speaking. He did

not recognize his nurse five minutes ago.”

As bad as that! But I did not despair. I did not dare to. I had staked

everything on this interview, and I was not going to lose its promised

results from any lack of effort on my own part.

“Let me see him,” I repeated.

I was taken in. The few persons I saw clustered about a narrow cot in

one corner gave way and I was cut to the heart to see that they did

this not so much out of consideration for me or my errand there as from

the consciousness that their business at the bedside of this dying man

was over. He was on the point of breathing his last. I pressed forward,

and after one quick scrutiny of the closed eyes and pale face I knelt

at his side and whispered a name into his ear. It was that of Veronica

Moore.

He started; they all saw it. On the threshold of death, some emotion—we

never knew what one—drew him back for an instant, and the pale cheek

showed a suspicion of color. Though the eyes did not open, the lips

moved, and I caught these words:

“Kept word—told no one—she was so—”

And that was all. He died the next instant.

Well! I was woefully done up by this sudden extinction of all my hopes.

They had been extravagant, no doubt, but they had sustained me through

all my haps and mishaps, trials and dangers, till now, here, they ended

with the one inexorable fact-death. Was I doomed to defeat, then? Must

I go back to the major with my convictions unchanged but with no fresh

proof, no real evidence to support them? I certainly must. With the

death of this man, all means of reaching the state of Mrs. Jeffrey’s

mind immediately preceding her marriage were gone. I could never learn

now what to know would make a man of me and possibly save Cora Tuttle.

Bending under this stroke of Providence, I passed out. A little boy was

sobbing at the tent door. I stared at him curiously, and was hurrying

on, when I felt myself caught by the hand.

“Take me with you,” cried a choked and frightened voice in my ear. “I

have no friend here, now _he_ is gone; take me back to Washington.”

Washington! I turned and looked at the lad who, kneeling in the hot

sand at the door of the tent, was clutching me with imploring hands.

“Who are you?” I asked; “and how came you here? Do you belong to the

army?”

“I helped care for his horse,” he whispered. “He found me smuggled on

board the train—for I was bound to go to the war—and he was sorry for

me and used to give me bits of his own rations, but—but now no one will

give me anything. Take me back; she won’t care. She’s dead, they say.

Besides, I wouldn’t stay here now if she was alive and breathing. I

have had enough of war since he—Oh, he was good to me—I never cared for

any one so much.”

I looked at the boy with an odd sensation for which I have no name.

“Whom are you talking about?” I asked. “Your mother—your sister?”

“Oh, no;” the tone was simplicity itself. “Never had no mother. I mean

the lady at the big house; the one that was married. She gave me money

to go out of Washington, and, wanting to be a soldier, I followed Curly

Jim. I didn’t think he’d die—he looked so strong— What’s the matter,

sir? Have I said anything I shouldn’t?”

I had him by the arm. I fear that I was shaking him.

“The lady!” I repeated. “She who was married—who gave you money. Wasn’t

it Mrs. Jeffrey?”

“Yes, I believe that was the name of the man she married. I didn’t know

_him;_ but I saw _her_—”

“Where? And why did she give you money? I will take you home with me if

you tell me the truth about it.”

He glanced back at the tent from which I had slightly drawn him and a

hungry look crept into his eyes.

“Well, it’s no secret now,” he muttered. “He used to say I must keep my

mouth shut; but he wouldn’t say so now if he knew I could get home by

telling. He used to be sorry for me, he used. What do you want to

know?”

“Why Mrs. Jeffrey gave you money to leave Washington.”

The boy trembled, drew a step away, and then came back, and under those

hot Florida skies, in the turmoil of departing troops, I heard these

words:

“Because I heard what she said to Jim.”

I felt my heart go down, then up, up, beyond anything I had ever

experienced in my whole life. The way before me was not closed then. A

witness yet remained, though Jim was dead. The boy was oblivious of my

emotion; he was staring with great mournfulness at the tent.

“And what was that?” said I.

His attention, which had been wandering, came back, and it was with

some surprise he said:

“It was not much. She told him to take the gentleman into the library.

But it was the library where men died, and he just went and died there,

too, you remember, and Jim said he wasn’t ever going to speak of it,

and so I promised not to, neither, but—but—when do you think you will

be starting, sir?”

I did not answer him. I was feeling very queer, as men feel, I suppose,

who in some crisis or event recognize an unexpected interposition of

Providence.

“Are you the boy who ran away from the florist’s in Washington?” I

inquired when ready to speak. “The boy who delivered Miss Moore’s

bridal bouquet?”

“Yes, sir.”

I let go of his hand and sat down. Surely there was a power greater

than chance governing this matter. Through what devious ways and from

what unexpected sources had I come upon this knowledge?

“Mrs. Jeffrey, or Miss Moore, as she was then, told Jim to seat the

gentleman in the library,” I now said. “Why?”

“I do not know. He told her the gentleman’s name and then she whispered

him that. I heard her, and that was why I got money, too. But it’s all

gone now. Oh, sir, _when_ are you going back?”

I started to my feet. Was it in answer to this appeal or because I

realized that I had come at last upon a clue calling for immediate

action?

“I am going now,” said I, “and you are going with me. Run! for the

train we take leaves inside of ten minutes. My business here is over.”

XX.

“THE COLONEL’S OWN”

Words can not express the tediousness of that return journey. The

affair which occupied all my thoughts was as yet too much enveloped in

mystery for me to contemplate it with anything but an anxious and

inquiring mind. While I clung with new and persistent hope to the

thread which had been put in my hand, I was too conscious of the maze

through which we must yet pass, before the light could be reached, to

feel that lightness of spirit which in itself might have lessened the

hours, and made bearable those days of forced inaction. To beguile the

way a little, I made a complete analysis of the facts as they appeared

to me in the light of this latest bit of evidence. The result was not

strikingly encouraging, yet I will insert it, if only in proof of my

diligence and the extreme interest I experienced in each and every

stage of this perplexing affair. It again took the form of a summary

and read as follows:

Facts as they now appear:

1. The peremptory demand for an interview which had been delivered to

Miss Moore during the half-hour preceding her marriage had come, not

from the bridegroom as I had supposed, but from the so-called stranger,

Mr. Pfeiffer.

2. Her reply to this demand had been an order for that gentleman to be

seated in the library.

3. The messenger carrying this order had been met and earnestly talked

with by Mr. Jeffrey either immediately before or immediately after the

aforementioned gentleman had been so seated.

4. Death reached Mr. Pfeiffer before the bride did.

5. Miss Moore remained in ignorance of this catastrophe till after her

marriage, no intimation of the same having been given her by the few

persons allowed to approach her before she descended to her nuptials;

yet she was seen to shrink unaccountably when her husband’s lips

touched hers, and when informed of the dreadful event before which she

beheld all her guests fleeing, went from the house a changed woman.

6. For all this proof that Mr. Pfeiffer was well known to her, if not

to the rest of the bridal party, no acknowledgment of this was made by

any of them then or afterward, nor any contradiction given either by

husband or wife to the accepted theory that this seeming stranger from

the West had gone into this fatal room of the Moores’ to gratify his

own morbid curiosity.

7. On the contrary, an extraordinary effort was immediately made by Mr.

Jeffrey to rid himself of the only witnesses who could tell the truth

concerning those fatal ten minutes; but this brought no peace to the

miserable wife, who never again saw a really happy moment.

8. Extraordinary efforts at concealment argue extraordinary causes for

fear. Fully to understand the circumstances of Mrs. Jeffrey’s death, it

would be necessary first to know what had happened in the Moore house

when Mr. Jeffrey learned from Curly Jim that the man, whose hold upon

his bride had been such that he dared to demand an interview with her

just as she was on the point of descending to her nuptials, had been

seated, or was about to be seated, in the room where death had once

held its court and might easily be persuaded to hold court again.

This was the limit of my conclusions. I could get no further, and

awaited my arrival in Washington with the greatest impatience. But once

there, and the responsibility of this new inquiry shifted to broader

shoulders than my own, I was greatly surprised and as deeply chagrined

to observe the whole affair lag unaccountably and to note that, in

spite of my so-called important discoveries, the prosecution continued

working up the case against Miss Tuttle in manifest intention of

presenting it to the grand jury at its fall sitting.

Whether Durbin was to blame for this I could not say. Certainly his

look was more or less quizzical when next we met, and this nettled me

so that I at once came to the determination that whatever was in his

mind, or in the minds of the men whose counsels he undoubtedly shared,

I was going to make one more great effort on my own account; not to

solve the main mystery, which had passed out of my hands, but to reach

the hidden cause of the equally unexplained deaths which had occurred

from time to time at the library fireplace.

For nothing could now persuade me that the two mysteries were not

indissolubly connected, or that the elucidation of the one would not

lead to the elucidation of the other.

To be sure, it was well accepted at headquarters that all possible

attempts had been made in this direction and with nothing but failure

as a result. The floor, the hearth, the chimney, and, above all, the

old settle, had been thoroughly searched. But to no avail. The secret

had not been reached and had almost come to be looked upon as

insolvable.

But I was not one to be affected by other men’s failures. The

encouragement afforded me by my late discoveries was such that I felt

confident that nothing could hinder my success save the necessity of

completely pulling down the house. Besides, all investigation had

hitherto started, if it had not ended, in the library. I was resolved

to begin work in quite a different spot. I had not forgotten the

sensations I had experienced in the southwest chamber.

During my absence this house had been released from surveillance. But

the major still held the keys and I had no difficulty in obtaining

them. The next thing was to escape its owner’s vigilance. This I

managed to do through the assistance of Jinny, and when midnight came

and all lights went out in the opposite cottage I entered boldly upon

the scene.

As before, I went first of all to the library. It was important to know

at the outset that this room was in its normal condition. But this was

not my only reason for prefacing my new efforts by a visit to this

scene of death and mysterious horror. I had another, so seemingly

puerile, that I almost hesitate to mention it and would not if the

sequel warranted its omission.

I wished to make certain that I had exhausted every suspected, as well

as every known clue, to the information I sought. In my long journey

home and the hours of thought it had forced upon me, I had more than

once been visited by flitting visions of things seen in this old house

and afterward nearly forgotten. Among these was the book which on that

first night of hurried search had given proofs of being in some one’s

hand within a very short period. The attention I had given it at a

moment of such haste was necessarily cursory, and when later a second

opportunity was granted me of looking into it again, I had allowed a

very slight obstacle to deter me. This was a mistake I was anxious to

rectify. Anything which had been touched with purpose at or near the

time of so mysterious a tragedy,—and the position of this book on a

shelf so high that a chair was needed to reach it proved that it had

been sought and touched with purpose, held out the promise of a clue

which one on so blind a trail as myself could not afford to ignore.

But when I had taken the book down and read again its totally

uninteresting and unsuggestive title and, by another reference to its

dim and faded leaves, found that my memory had not played me false and

that it contained nothing but stupid and wholly irrelevant statistics,

my confidence in it as a possible aid in the work I had in hand

departed just as it had on the previous occasion. I was about to put it

back on the shelf, when I bethought me of running my hand in behind the

two books between which it had stood. Ah! that was it! Another book lay

flat against the wall at the back of the shelf; and when, by the

removal of those in front I was enabled to draw this book out, I soon

saw why it had been relegated to such a remote place of concealment on

the shelves of the Moore library.

It was a collection of obscure memoirs written by an English woman, but

an English woman who had been in America during the early part of the

century, and who had been brought more or less into contact with the

mysteries connected with the Moore house in Washington. Several

passages were marked, one particularly, by a heavy pencil-line running

the length of the margin. As the name of Moore was freely scattered

through these passages as well as through two or three faded newspaper

clippings which I discovered pasted on the inside cover, I lost no time

in setting about their perusal.

The following extracts are from the book itself, taken in the order in

which I found them marked:

“It was about this time that I spent a week in the Moore house; that

grand and historic structure concerning which and its occupants so many

curious rumors are afloat. I knew nothing then of its discreditable

fame; but from the first moment of my entrance into its ample and well

lighted halls I experienced a sensation which I will not call dread,

but which certainly was far from being the impulse of pure delight

which the graciousness of my hostess and the imposing character of the

place itself were calculated to produce. This emotion was but

transitory, vanishing, as was natural, in the excitement of my welcome

and the extraordinary interest I took in Callista Moore, who in those

days was a most fascinating little body. Small to the point of

appearing diminutive, and lacking all assertion in manner and bearing,

she was nevertheless such a lady that she easily dominated all who

approached her, and produced, quite against her will I am sure, an

impression of aloofness seasoned with kindness, which made her a most

surprising and entertaining study to the analytic observer. Her

position as nominal mistress of an establishment already accounted one

of the finest in Washington,—the real owner, Reuben Moore, preferring

to live abroad with his French wife,—gave to her least action an

importance which her shy, if not appealing looks, and a certain

strained expression most difficult to characterize, vainly attempted to

contradict. I could not understand her, and soon gave up the attempt;

but my admiration held firm, and by the time the evening was half over

I was her obedient slave. I think from what I know of her now that she

would have preferred to be mine.

“I was put to sleep in a great chamber which I afterward heard called

‘The Colonel’s Own.’ It was very grand and had a great bed in it almost

royal in its size and splendor. I believe that I shrank quite

unaccountably from this imposing piece of furniture when I first looked

at it; it seemed so big and so out of proportion to my slim little

body. But admonished by the look which I surprised on Mistress

Callista’s high-bred face, I quickly recalled an expression so unsuited

to my position as guest, and, with a gush of well-simulated rapture,

began to expatiate upon the interesting characteristics of the room,

and express myself as delighted at the prospect of sleeping there.

“Instantly the nervous look left her, and, with the quiet remark, ‘It

was my father’s room,’ she set down the candles with which both her

hands were burdened, and gave me a kiss so warm and surcharged with

feeling that it sufficed to keep me happy and comfortable for a

half-hour or more after she passed out.

“I had thought myself a very sleepy girl, but when, after a somewhat

lengthened brooding over the dying embers in the open fireplace, I lay

down behind the curtains of the huge bed, I found myself as far from

sleep as I had ever been in my whole life.

“And I did not recover from this condition for the entire night. For

hours I tossed from one side of the bed to the other in my efforts to

avoid the persistent eyes of a scarcely-to-be-perceived drawing facing

me from the opposite wall. It had no merit as a picture, this drawing,

but seen as it was under the rays of a gibbous moon looking in through

the half-open shutter, it exercised upon me a spell such as I can not

describe and hope never again to experience. Finally I rose and pulled

the curtains violently together across the foot of the bed. This shut

out the picture; but I found it worse to imagine it there with its

haunting eyes peering at me through the intervening folds of heavy

damask than to confront it openly; so I pushed the curtains back again,

only to rise a half-hour later and twitch them desperately together

once more.

“I fidgeted and worried so that night that I must have looked quite

pale when my attentive hostess met me at the head of the stairs the

next morning. For her hand shook quite perceptibly as she grasped mine,

and her voice was pitched in no natural key as she inquired how I had

slept. I replied, as truth, if not courtesy, demanded, ‘Not as well as

usual,’ whereupon her eyes fell and she remarked quite hurriedly; ‘I am

so sorry; you shall have another room tonight,’ adding, in what

appeared to be an unconscious whisper: ‘There is no use; all feel it;

even the young and the gay;’ then aloud and with irrepressible anxiety:

‘You didn’t _see_ anything, dear?’

“‘No!’ I protested in suddenly awakened dismay; ‘only the strange eyes

of that queer drawing peering at me through the curtains of my bed. Is

it—is it a haunted room?’

“Her look was a shocked one, her protest quite vehement. ‘Oh, no! No

one has ever witnessed anything like a ghost there, but every one finds

it impossible to sleep in that bed or even in the room. I do not know

why, unless it is that my father spent so many weary years of incessant

wakefulness inside its walls.’

“‘And did he die in that bed?’ I asked.

“She gave a startled shiver, and drew me hurriedly downstairs. As we

paused at the foot, she pressed my hand and whispered:

“‘Yes; at night; with the full of the moon upon him.’

“I answered her look with one she probably understood as little as I

did hers. I had heard of this father of hers. He had been a terrible

old man and had left a terrible memory behind him.

“The next day my room was changed according to her promise, but in the

light of the charges I have since heard uttered against that house and

the family who inhabit it, I am glad that I spent one night in what, if

it was not a haunted chamber, had certainly a very thrilling effect

upon its occupants.”

Second passage; the italics showing where it was most heavily marked.

“The house contained another room as interesting as the one I have

already mentioned. It went by the name of the library and its walls

were heavily lined with books; but the family never sat there, nor was

I ever fortunate enough to see it with its doors unclosed except on the

occasion of the grand reception Mistress Callista gave in my honor. I

have a fancy for big rooms and more than once urged my hostess to tell

me why this one stood neglected. But the lady was not communicative on

this topic and it was from another member of the household I learned

that its precincts had been forever clouded by the unexpected death

within them of one of her father’s friends, a noted army officer.

“Why this should have occasioned a permanent disuse of the spot I could

not understand, and as every one who conversed on this topic invariably

gave the impression of saying less than the subject demanded, my

curiosity soon became too much for me and I attacked Miss Callista once

again in regard to it. She gave me a quick smile, for she was always

amiable, but shook her head and introduced another topic. But one night

when the wind was howling in the chimneys and the sense of loneliness

was even greater than usual in the great house, we drew together on the

rug in front of my bedroom fire, and, as the embers burned down to

ashes before us, Miss Callista became more communicative.

“Her heart was heavy, she told me; had been heavy for years. Perhaps

some ray of comfort would reach her if she took a friend into her

confidence. God knew that she needed one, especially on nights like

this, when the wind woke echoes all over the house and it was hard to

tell which most to fear, the sounds which came from no one knew where,

or the silence which settled after.

“She trembled as she said this, and instinctively drew nearer my side

so that our heads almost touched over the flickering flame from whose

heat and light we sought courage. She seemed to feel grateful for this

contact, and the next minute, flinging all her scruples to the wind,

she began a relation of events which more or less answered my late

unwelcome queries.

“The death in the library, about which her most perplexing memory hung,

took place when she was a child and her father held that high

governmental position which has reflected so much credit upon the

family. Her father and the man who thus perished had been intimate

friends. They had fought together in the War of 1812 and received the

same distinguishing marks of presidential approval afterward. They were

both members of an important commission which brought them into

diplomatic relations with England. It was while serving on this

commission that the sudden break occurred which ended all intimate

relations between them, and created a change in her father that was

equally remarked at home and abroad. What occasioned this break no one

knew. Whether his great ambition had received some check through the

jealousy of this so-called friend—a supposition which did not seem

possible, as he rose rapidly after this—or on account of other causes

darkly hinted at by his contemporaries, but never breaking into open

gossip, he was never the same man afterwards. His children, who used to

rush with effusion to greet him, now shrank into corners at his step,

or slid behind half open doors, whence they peered with fearful

interest at his tall figure, pacing in moody silence the halls of his

ancestral home, or sitting with frowning brows over the embers dying

away on the great hearthstone of his famous library.

“Their mother, who was an invalid, did not share these terrors. The

father was ever tender of her, and the only smile they ever saw on his

face came with his entrance into her darkened room.

“Such were Callista Moore’s first memories. Those which followed were

more definite and much more startling. President Jackson, who had a

high opinion of her father’s ability, advanced him rapidly. Finally a

position was given him which raised him into national prominence. As

this had been the goal of his ambition for years, he was much gratified

by this appointment, and though his smiles came no more frequently, his

frowns lightened, and from being positively threatening, became simply

morose.

“Why this moroseness should have sharpened into menace after an

unexpected visit from his once dear, but long estranged

companion-in-arms, his daughter, even after long years of constant

brooding upon this subject, dares not decide. If she could she might be

happier.

“The general was a kindly man, sharp of face and of a tall thin figure,

but with an eye to draw children and make them happy with a look. But

his effect on the father was different. From the moment the two met in

the great hall below, the temper of the host betrayed how little he

welcomed this guest. He did not fail in courtesy—the Moores are always

gentlemen—but it was a hard courtesy, which cut while it flattered. The

two children, shrinking from its edge without knowing what it was that

hurt them, slunk to covert, and from behind the two pillars which mark

the entrance to the library, watched the two men as they walked up and

down the halls discussing the merits of this and that detail of the

freshly furnished mansion. These two innocent, but eager spies, whom

fear rather than curiosity held in hiding, even caught some of the

sentences which passed between the so-called friends; and though these

necessarily conveyed but little meaning to their childish minds, the

words forming them were never forgotten, as witness these phrases

confided to me by Mistress Callista twenty-five years afterward.

“‘You have much that most men lack,’ remarked the general, as they

paused to admire some little specimen of Italian art which had been

lately received from Genoa. ‘You have money—too much money, Moore, by

an amount I might easily name—a home which some might call palatial, a

lovely, if not altogether healthy wife, two fine children, and all the

honor which a man in a commonwealth like this should ask for. _Drop

politics_.’

“‘Politics are my life,’ was the cold response. ‘To bid me drop them is

to bid me commit suicide.’ Then, as an afterthought to which a moment

of intervening silence added emphasis, ‘And for you to drive me from

them would be an act little short of murder.’

“‘Justice dealt upon a traitor is not murder,’ was the stern and

unyielding reply. ‘By one black deed of treacherous barter and sale, of

which none of your countrymen is cognizant but myself, you have

forfeited the confidence of this government. Were I, who so unhappily

surprised your secret, to allow you to continue in your present place

of trust, I myself would be a traitor to the republic for which I have

fought and for which I am ready to die. That is why I ask you to resign

before—’

“The two children did not catch the threat latent in that last word,

but they realized the force of it from their father’s look and were

surprised when he quietly said:

“‘You declare yourself to be the only man on the commission who is

acquainted with the facts you are pleased to style traitorous?’

“The general’s lips curled. ‘Have I not said?’ he asked.

“Something in this stern honesty seemed to affect the father. His face

turned away and it was the other’s voice which was next heard. A change

had taken place in it and it sounded almost mellow as it gave form to

these words:

“‘Alpheus, we have been friends. You shall have two weeks in which to

think over my demand and decide. If at the end of that time you have

not returned to domestic life you may expect another visit from me

which can not fail of consequences. You know my temper when roused. Do

not force me into a position which will cause us both endless regret.’

“Perhaps the father answered; perhaps he did not. The children heard

nothing further, but they witnessed the gloom with which he rode away

to the White House the next day. Remembering the general’s threat, they

imagined in their childish hearts that their father had gone to give up

his post and newly acquired honors. But he returned at night without

having done so, and from that day on carried his head higher and showed

himself more and more the master, both at home and abroad.

“But he was restless, very restless, and possibly to allay a great

mental uneasiness, he began having some changes made in the house;

changes which occupied much of his time and with which he never seemed

satisfied. Men working one day were dismissed the next and others

called in until this work and everything else was interrupted by the

return of his late unwelcome guest, who kept his appointment to a day.

“At this point in her narrative Mistress Callista’s voice fell and the

flame which had thrown a partial light on her countenance died down

until I could but faintly discern the secretly inquiring look with

which she watched me as she went on to say

“‘Reuben and I,’—Reuben was her brother,—‘were posted in the dark

corner under the stairs when my father met the general at the door. We

had expected to hear high words, or some explosion of bitter feeling

between them, and hardly knew whether to be glad or sorry when our

father welcomed his guest with the same elaborate bow we once saw him

make to the president in the grounds of the White House. Nor could we

understand what followed. We were summoned in to supper. Our mother was

there—a great event in those days—and toasts were drunk and our father

proposed one to the general’s health. This Reuben thought was an open

signal of peace, and turned upon me his great round eyes in surprise;

but I, who was old enough to notice that this toast was not responded

to and that the general did not even touch his lips to the glass he had

lifted in compliment to our mother, who had lifted hers, felt that

there was something terrifying rather than reassuring in this attempt

at good fellowship.

Though unable to reason over it at the time, I have often done so

since, and my father’s attitude and look as he faced this strange guest

has dwelt so persistently in my memory that scarcely a year passes

without the scene coming up in my dreams with its accompanying emotions

of fear and perplexity. For—perhaps you know the story—that hour was

the general’s last. He died before leaving the house; died in that same

dark library concerning which you have asked so many questions.

“‘I remember the circumstances well, how well down to each and every

detail. Our mother had gone back to her room, and the general and my

father, who did not linger over their wine—why should they, when the

general would not drink?—had withdrawn to the library at the suggestion

of the general, whose last words are yet lingering in my ears.

“‘The time has come for our little talk,’ said he. ‘Your reception

augurs—’

“‘You do not look well,’ my father here broke in, in what seemed an

unnaturally loud voice. ‘Come and sit down—’

“‘Here the door closed.

“‘We had hung about this door, curious children that we were, in hopes

of catching a glimpse of the queer new settle which had been put into

place that day. But we scampered away at this, and were playing in and

out of the halls when the library door again opened and my father came

out.

“‘Where’s Samba?’ he cried. ‘Tell him to carry a glass of wine in to

the general. I do not like his looks. I am going upstairs for some

medicine.’ This he whispered in choked tones as he set foot on the

stairs. Why I remember it I do not know, for Reuben, who was standing

where he could look into the library when our father came out and saw

the settle and the general sitting at one end of it, was chattering

about it in my ear at the very moment our father was giving his orders.

“‘Reuben is a man now, and I have asked him more than once since then

how the general looked at that critical instant. It is important to me,

very, very important, and to him, too, now that he has come to know a

man’s passions and temptations. But he will never tell me, never

relieve my mind, and I can only hope that there were real signs of

illness on the general’s brow; for then I could feel that all had been

right and that his death was the natural result of the great distress

he felt at opposing my father in the one desire of his heart. That

glimpse which Reuben had of him before he fell has always struck me

with strange pathos. A little child looking in upon a man, who, for all

his apparent health, will in another moment be in eternity—I do not

wonder he does not like to talk of it, and yet—

“‘It was Samba who came upon the general first. Our father had not yet

descended. When he did, it was with loud cries and piteous

ejaculations. Word had gone upstairs and surprised him in the room with

my mother. I recollect wondering in all childish simplicity why he

wrung his hands so over the death of a man he so hated and feared. Nor

was it till years had passed and our mother had been laid in the grave

and the house had settled into a gloom too heavy and somber for Reuben

to endure, that I recognized in my father the signs of a settled

remorse. These I endeavored to account for by the fact that he had been

saved from what he looked upon as political death by the sudden but

opportune decease of his best friend. This caused a shock to his

feelings which had unnerved him for life. Don’t you think this the true

explanation of his invariably moody brow and the great distaste he

always showed for this same library? Though he would live in no other

house, he would not enter that room nor look at the gloomy settle from

which the general had fallen to his death. The place was virtually

tabooed, and though, as the necessity arose, it was opened from time to

time for great festivities, the shadow it had acquired never left it

and my father hated its very door until he died. Is it not natural that

his daughter should share this feeling?’

“It was, and I said so; but I would say no more, though she cast me

little appealing looks which acquired an eery significance from the

pressure of her small fingers on my arm and the wailing sound of the

wind which at that moment blew down in one gust, scattering the embers

and filling the house with banshee calls. I simply kissed her and

advised her to go back with me to England and forget this old house and

all its miserable memories. For that was the sum of the comfort at my

poor command. When, after another restless night, I crept down in the

early morning to peer into the dim and unused room whose story I had at

last learned, I can not say but that I half expected to behold the

meager ghost of the unfortunate general rise from the cushions of the

prodigious bench which still kept its mysterious watch over the

deserted hearthstone.”

So much for the passages culled from the book itself. The newspaper

excerpts, to which I next turned, bore a much later date, and read as

follows:

“A strange coincidence marks the death of Albert Moore in his brother’s

house yesterday. He was discovered lying with his head on the identical

spot where General Lloyd fell forty years before. It is said that this

sudden demise of a man hitherto regarded as a model of physical

strength and endurance was preceded by a violent altercation with his

elder brother. If this is so, the excitement incident upon such a break

in their usually pleasant relations may account for his sudden death.

Edward Moore, _who, unfortunately, was out of the room when his brother

succumbed—some say that he was in his grandfather’s room above_—was

greatly unnerved by this unexpected end to what was probably merely a

temporary quarrel, and now lies in a critical condition.

“The relations between him and the deceased Albert have always been of

the most amicable character until they unfortunately fell in love with

the same woman.”

Attached to this was another slip, apparently from a later paper.

“The quarrel between the two brothers Moore, just prior to the younger

one’s death, turns out to have been of a more serious nature than was

first supposed. It has since leaked out that an actual duel was fought

at that time between these two on the floor of the old library; and

that in this duel the elder one was wounded. Some even go so far as to

affirm that the lady’s hand was to be the reward of him who drew the

first blood; it _is no longer denied that the room was in great

disorder when the servants first rushed in at the sound he made in

falling_. Everything movable had been pushed back against the wall and

an open space cleared, in the center of which could be seen one drop of

blood. What is certain is that Mr. Moore is held to the house by

something even more serious than his deep grief, and that the young

lady who was the object of this fatal dispute has left the city.”

Pasted under this was the following short announcement:

“Married on the twenty-first of January, at the American consulate in

Rome, Italy, Edward Moore, of Washington, D. C., United States of

America, to Antoinette Sloan, daughter of Joseph Dewitt Sloan, also of

that city.”

With this notice my interest in the book ceased and I prepared to step

down from the chair on which I had remained standing during the reading

of the above passages.

As I did so I spied a slip of paper lying on the floor at my feet. As

it had not been there ten minutes before there could be little doubt

that it had slipped from the book whose leaves I had been turning over

so rapidly. Hastening to recover it, I found it to be a sheet of

ordinary note paper partly inscribed with words in a neat and

distinctive handwriting. This was a great find, for the paper was fresh

and the handwriting one which could be readily identified. What I saw

written there was still more remarkable. It had the look of some of the

memoranda I had myself drawn up during the most perplexing moments of

this strange case. I transcribe it just as it read:

“We have here two separate accounts of how death comes to those who

breathe their last on the ancestral hearthstone of the Moore house

library.

“Certain facts are emphasized in both:

“Each victim was alone when he fell.

“Each death was preceded by a scene of altercation or violent

controversy between the victim and the alleged master of these

premises.

“In each case the master of the house reaped some benefit, real or

fancied, from the other’s death.”

A curious set of paragraphs. Some one besides myself was searching for

the very explanation I was at that moment intent upon. I should have

considered it the work of our detectives if the additional lines I now

came upon could have been written by any one but a Moore. But no one of

any other blood or associations could have indited the amazing words

which followed. The only excuse I could find for them was the

difficulty which some men feel in formulating their thoughts otherwise

than with pen and paper, they were so evidently intended for the

writer’s eye and understanding only, as witness:

“Let me recall the words my father was uttering when my brother rushed

in upon us with that account of my misdeeds which changed all my

prospects in life. It was my twenty-first birthday and the old man had

just informed me that as the eldest son I might expect the house in

which we stood to be mine one day and with it a secret which has been

handed down from father to son ever since the Moores rose to eminence

in the person of Colonel Alpheus. Then he noted that I was now of age

and immediately went on to say: ‘This means that you must be told

certain facts, without the knowledge of which you would be no true

Moore. These facts you must hereafter relate to your son or whoever may

be fortunate enough to inherit from you. It is the legacy which goes

with this house and one which no inheritor as yet has refused either to

receive or to transmit. Listen. You have often noted the gold filigree

ball which I wear on my watch-guard. This ball is the talisman of our

house, of this house. If, in the course of your life you find yourself

in an extremity from which no issue seems possible mind the strictness

of the injunction—an extremity from which no issue seems possible (I

have never been in such a case; the gold filigree ball has never been

opened by me) you will take this trinket from its chain, press upon

this portion of it so, and use what you will find inside, in connection

with—’ Alas! it was at this point John Judson came rushing in and those

disclosures were made which lost me my father’s regard and gave to the

informer my rightful inheritance, together with the full secret of

which I only got a part. But that part must help me now to the whole. I

have seen the filigree ball many times; Veronica has it now. But its

contents have never been shown me. If I knew what they were and why the

master of this secret always left the library—”

Here the memorandum ceased with a long line straggling from the letter

y as if the writer had been surprised at his task.

The effect upon me of these remarkable words was to heighten my

interest and raise me into a state of renewed hope, if not of active

expectation.

Another mind than my own had been at work along the only groove which

held out any promise of success, and this mind, having at its command

certain family traditions, had let me into a most valuable secret.

Another mind! Whose mind? That was a question easily answered. But one

man could have written these words; the man who was thrust aside in

early life in favor of his younger brother, and who now, by the sudden

death of that brother’s daughter, had come again into his inheritance.

Uncle David, and he only, was the puzzled inquirer whose

self-communings I had just read. This fact raised a new problem far me

to work upon, and I could but ask when these lines were written—before

or after Mr. Pfeiffer’s death and whether he had ever succeeded in

solving the riddle he had suggested, or whether it was still a baffling

mystery to him. I was so moved by the suggestion conveyed in his final

and half-finished sentence, that I soon lost sight of these lesser

inquiries in the more important one connected with the filigree ball.

For I had seen this filigree ball. I had even handled it. From the

description given I was very certain that it had been one of the many

trinkets I had observed lying on the dressing table when I made my

first hasty examination of the room on the evening of Mrs. Jeffrey’s

death. Why had no premonition of its importance as a connecting link

between these tragedies and their mysterious cause come to me at the

time when it was within reach of my hand? It was too late now. It had

been swept away with the other loose objects littering the place, and

my opportunity for pursuing this very promising investigation was gone

for the night.

Yet it was with a decided feeling of triumph that I finally locked the

door of this old mansion behind me. Certainly I had taken a step

forward since my entrance there, to which I had but to add another of

equal importance to merit the attention of the superintendent himself.

XXI.

THE HEART OF THE PUZZLE.

The next morning I swallowed my pride and sought out Durbin. He had

superintended the removal of Mrs. Jeffrey’s effects from the southwest

chamber, and should know, if any one, where this filigree ball was now

to be found. Doubtless it had been returned with the other things to

Mr. Jeffrey, and yet, who knows? Durbin is sly and some inkling of its

value as a clue may have entered his mind. If so, it would be anywhere

but in Mr. Jeffrey’s or Miss Tuttle’s possession.

To test my rival’s knowledge of and interest in this seemingly trivial

object, I stooped to what I can but consider a pardonable subterfuge.

Greeting him in the offhand way least likely to develop his suspicion,

I told him that I had a great idea in connection with the Jeffrey case

and that the clue to it lay in a little gold ball which Mrs. Jeffrey

sometimes wore and upon which she set great store. So far I spoke the

truth. It had been given her by some one—not Mr. Jeffrey—and I

believed, though I did not know, that it contained a miniature portrait

which it might be to our advantage to see.

I expected his lip to curl; but for a wonder it maintained its

noncommittal aspect, though I was sure that I caught a slight, very

slight, gleam of curiosity lighting up for a moment his calm, gray eye.

“You are on a fantastic trail,” he sneered, and that was all.

But I had not expected more. I had merely wished to learn what place,

if any, this filigree ball held in his own suspicions, and in case he

had overlooked it, to jog his curiosity so that he would in some way

betray its whereabouts.

That, for all its seeming inconsequence, it did hold some place in his

mind was evident enough to those who knew him; but that it was within

reach or obtainable by any ordinary means was not so plain. Indeed, I

very soon became convinced that he, for one, had no idea where it was,

or after the suggestive hint I had given him he would never have wasted

a half-hour on me. What was I to do then? Tell my story to the major

and depend on him to push the matter to its proper conclusion? “Not

yet,” whispered pride. “Durbin thinks you a fool. Wait till you can

show your whole hand before calling attention to your cards.” But it

was hard not to betray my excitement and to act the fool they

considered me when the boys twitted me about this famous golden charm

and asked what great result had followed my night in the Moore house.

But remembering that he who laughs last laughs best, and that the cause

of mirth was not yet over between Durbin and myself, I was able to

preserve an impassive exterior even when I came under the major’s eye.

I found myself amply repaid when one of the boys who had studiously

avoided chaffing me dropped the following words in my ear:

“I don’t know what your interest is in the small gold charm you were

talking about, but you have done some good work in this case and I

don’t mind telling you what I know about it. That little gold ball has

caused the police much trouble. It is on the list of effects found in

the room where the candle was seen burning; but when all these petty

belongings of Mrs. Jeffrey’s were gathered up and carried back to her

husband, this special one was not to be found amongst them. It was lost

in transit, nor has it ever been seen since. And who do you think it

was who called attention to this loss and demanded that the article be

found? Not Mr. Jeffrey, who seems to lay little or no stress upon it,

but the old man they call Uncle David. He who, to all appearance,

possessed no interest in his niece’s personal property, was on hand the

moment these things were carried into her husband’s house, with the

express intention, it seems, of inquiring for this gold ball, which he

declared to be a family heirloom. As such it belonged to him as the

present holder of the property, and to him only. Attention being thus

called to it, it was found to be missing, and as no one but the police

seemed to be to blame for its loss the matter was hushed up and would

have been regarded as too insignificant for comment, the trinket being

intrinsically worthless, if Mr. Moore had not continued to make such a

fuss about it. This ball, he declared, was worth as much to a Moore as

all the rest of his property, which was bosh, you know; and the folly

of these assertions and the depth of the passions he displayed whenever

the subject was mentioned have made some of us question if he is the

innocent inheritor he has tried to make himself out. At all events, I

know for a certainty that the district attorney holds his name in

reserve, if the grand jury fails to bring in an indictment against Miss

Tuttle.”

“The district attorney is wise,” I remarked, and fell athinking.

Had this latent suspicion against Mr. Moore any solid foundation? Was

he the guilty man? The memorandum I had come across in the book which

had been lately pulled down from the library shelves showed that,

notwithstanding his testimony to the contrary, he had been in that

house close upon that fatal night, if not on the very night itself. It

also showed his extreme interest in the traditions of the family. But

did it show anything more? Had he interrupted his writing to finish his

query in blood, and had one of his motives for this crime been the

acquisition of this filigree ball? If so, why had he left it on the

table upstairs? A candle had been lit in that room—could it have been

by him in his search for this object? It would be a great relief to

believe so. What was the reason then that my mind refused so

emphatically to grasp this possibility and settle upon him as the

murderer of Mrs. Jeffrey? I can not tell. I hated the man, and I

likewise deeply distrusted him. But I could not, even after this

revelation of his duplicity, connect him in my thoughts with absolute

crime without a shock to my intuitions. Happily, my scruples were not

shared by my colleagues. They had listed him. Here I felt my shoulder

touched, and a newspaper was thrust into my hand by the man who had

just addressed me.

“Look down the lost and found column,” said he. “The third

advertisement you will see there came from the district attorney’s

office; the next one was inserted by Mr. Moore himself.”

I followed his pointing finer and read two descriptions of the filigree

ball. The disproportion in the rewards offered was apparent. That

promised by Uncle David was calculated to rouse any man’s cupidity and

should have resulted in the bauble’s immediate return.

“He got ahead of the police that time,” I laughed. “When did these

advertisements appear?”

“During the days you were absent from Washington.”

“And how sure are you that he did not get this jewel back?”

“Oh, we are sure. His continued anxiety and still active interest prove

this, even if our surveillance had been less perfect.”

“And the police have been equally unsuccessful?”

“Equally.”

“After every effort?”

“Every.”

“Who was the man who collected and carried out those things from the

southwest chamber?”

He smiled.

“You see him,” said he.

“It was you?”

“Myself.”

“And you are sure this small ball was among them?”

“No. I only know that I have seen it somewhere, but that it wasn’t

among the articles I delivered to Mr. Jeffrey.”

“How did you carry them?”

“In a hand-bag which I locked myself.”

“Before leaving the southwest chamber?”

“Yes.”

“Then it is still in that room?”

“Find it,” was his laconic reply.

Here most men would have stopped, but I have a bulldog’s tenacity when

once I lay hold. That night I went back to the Moore house and, taking

every precaution against being surprised by the sarcastic Durbin or

some of his many flatterers, I ransacked the southwest chamber on my

own behalf for what certainly I had little reason to expect to find

there.

It seemed a hopeless cause from the first, but I acted as if no one had

hunted for this object before. Moving every article, I sought first on

the open floor and then in every possible cranny for the missing

trinket. But I failed to find it and was about to acknowledge myself

defeated when my eye fell on the long brocaded curtains which I had

drawn across the several windows to hide every gleam of light from the

street. They were almost free from folds, but I shook them well,

especially the one nearest the table, and naturally with no effect.

“Folly,” I muttered, yet did not quite desist. For the great tassels

still hung at the sides and— Well! you may call it an impossible find

or say that if the bauble was there it should have been discovered in

the first search for it! I will not say no. I can only tell you what

happened. When I took one of those tassels in my band, I thought, as it

twirled under my touch, that I saw something gleam in its faded old

threads which did not belong there. Startled, and yet not thoroughly

realizing that I had come upon the object of my search, I picked at

this thing and found it to be a morsel of gold chain that had become

entangled in it. When I had pulled it out, it showed a small golden

ball at one end, filigreed over and astonishingly heavy for its size

and apparent delicacy.

How it came there—whether it rolled from the table, or was swept off

inadvertently by the detective’s hand, and how it came to be caught by

this old tassel and held there in spite of the many shakings it must

have received, did not concern me at this momentous instant. The

talisman of this old family was found. I had but to discover what it

held concealed to understand what had baffled Mr. Moore and made the

mystery he had endeavored to penetrate so insolvable. Rejoicing in my

triumph, but not wasting a moment in self-congratulation, I bent over

the candle with my prize and sought for the clasp or fastening which

held its two parts together. I have a knack at clasps and curious

fastenings and was able at first touch to spring this one open. And

what did I find inside? Something so different from what I expected,

something so trivial and seemingly harmless, that it was not until I

recalled the final words of Uncle David’s memorandum that I realized

its full import and the possibilities it suggested. In itself it was

nothing but a minute magnifying glass; but when used in connection

with—what? Ah, that was just what Uncle David failed to say, possibly

to know. Yet this was now the important point, the culminating fact

which might lead to a full understanding of these many tragedies. Could

I hope to guess what presented itself to Mr. Moore as a difficult if

not insolvable problem? No; guessing would not answer. I must trust to

the inspiration of the moment which suggested with almost irresistible

conviction:

_The picture! That inane and seemingly worthless drawing over the

fireplace in The Colonel’s Own, whose presence in so rich a room has

always been a mystery!_

Why this object should have suggested itself to me and with such

instant conviction, I can not readily say. Whether, from my position

near the bed, the sight of this old drawing recalled the restless

nights of all who had lain in face of its sickly smile, or whether some

recollection of that secret law of the Moores which forbade the removal

of any of their pictures from the time-worn walls, or a remembrance of

the curiosity which this picture excited in every one who looked at

it—Francis Jeffrey among the number—I no sooner asked myself what

object in this house might possibly yield counsel or suggest aid when

subjected to the influence of a magnifying glass, than the answer,

which I have already given, sprang instantly into my mind: The picture!

Greatly excited, I sprang upon a chair, took down the drawing from the

wall and laid it face up on the bed. Then I placed the glass over one

of the large coils surrounding the insipid face, and was startled

enough, in spite of all mental preparation, to perceive the crinkly

lines which formed it, resolve themselves into script and the script

into words, some of which were perfectly legible.

The drawing, simple as it looked, was a communication in writing to

those who used a magnifying glass to read it. I could hardly contain my

triumph, hardly find the self-control necessary to a careful study of

its undulating and often conflicting lines and to the slow picking out

of the words therein contained.

But when I had done this, and had copied the whole of the wandering

scrawl on a page of my note book the result was of value.

Read, and judge for yourself.

“Coward that I am, I am willing to throw upon posterity the shadow of a

crime whose consequences I dare not incur in life. Confession I must

make. To die and leave no record of my deed is impossible. Yet how tell

my story so that only my own heirs may read and they when at the crisis

of their fate? I believe I have found the way by this drawing and the

injunction I have left to the holders of the filigree ball.

“No man ever wished his enemy dead more than I did, and no man ever

spent more cunning on the deed. Master in my own house, I contrived a

device by which the man who held my fate in his hands fell on my

library hearth with no one near and no sign by which to associate me

with the act. Does this seem like the assertion of a madman? Go to the

old chamber familiarly called “The Colonel’s Own.” Enter its closet,

pull out its two drawers, and in the opening thus made seek for the

loophole at the back, through which, if you stoop low enough, you can

catch a glimpse of the library hearth and its great settle. With these

in view, slip your finger along the wall on your right and when it

touches an obstruction—pass it if it is a handle, for that is only used

to rewind the apparatus and must be turned from you until it can be

turned no farther; but if it is a depression you encounter, press, and

press hard on the knob concealed within it. But beware when any one you

love is seated in that corner of the settle where the cushion invites

rest, lest it be your fate to mourn and wail as it is mine to curse the

hour when I sought to clear my way by murder. For the doom of the man

of blood is upon me. The hindrance is gone from my life, but a horror

has entered it beyond the conception of any soul that has not yielded

itself to the unimaginable influences emanating from an accomplished

crime. _I can not be content with having pressed that spring once_. A

mania is upon me which, after thirty years of useless resistance and

superhuman struggle, still draws me from bed and sleep to rehearse in

ghastly fashion that deed of my early manhood. I can not resist it. To

tear out the deadly mechanism, unhinge weight and drum and rid the

house of every evidence of crime would but drive me to shriek my guilt

aloud and act in open pantomime what I now go through in fearsome

silence and secrecy. When the hour comes, as come it must, that I can

not rise and enter that fatal closet, I shall still enact the deed in

dreams, and shriek aloud in my sleep and wish myself dead and yet fear

to die lest my hell be to go through all eternity, slaying over and

over my man, in ever growing horror and repulsion.

“Do you wish to share my fate? Try to effect through blood a release

from the difficulties menacing you.”

XXII.

A THREAD IN HAND

There are moments which stand out with intense force and clearness in

every man’s life. Mine was the one which followed the reading of these

lines which were meant for a warning, but which in more than one case

had manifestly served to open the way to a repetition of the very crime

they deplored. I felt myself under the same fascination. I wanted to

test the mechanism; to follow out then and there the instructions given

with such shortsighted minuteness and mark the result. But a sense of

decorum prevented. It was clearly my duty to carry so important a

discovery as this to the major and subject myself to his commands

before making the experiment suggested by the scroll I had so carefully

deciphered. Besides, it would be difficult to carry out this experiment

alone, and with no other light than that afforded by my lantern.

Another man and more lights were needed.

Influenced by these considerations, I restored the picture to its

place, and left the building. As I did so, the first signs of dawn

became visible in the east. I had expended three hours in picking out

the meaning concealed in the wavy lines of the old picture.

I was early at headquarters that morning, but not so early as to find

the superintendent alone. A group of men were already congregated about

him in his small office, and when, on being admitted, I saw amongst

them the district attorney, Durbin and another famous detective, I

instinctively knew what matter was under discussion.

I was allowed to remain, possibly because I brought news in my face,

possibly because the major felt more kindly toward me than I thought.

Though Durbin, who had been speaking, had at first sight of me shut his

mouth like a trap, and even went so far as to drum an impatient protest

with his fingers on the table before which he stood, neither the major

nor the district attorney turned an unkindly face toward me, and my

amiable friend was obliged to accept my presence with what grace he

could.

There was with them a fourth man, who stood apart. On him the general

attention had been concentrated at my entrance and to him it now

returned. He was an unpretentious person of kindly aspect. To any one

accustomed to Washington residents, he bore the unmistakable signs of

being one of the many departmental employees whose pay is inadequate to

the necessities of his family. Of his personal peculiarities I noted

two. He blinked when he talked, and stuttered painfully when excited.

Notwithstanding these defects he made a good impression, and commanded

confidence. This I soon saw was of importance, for the story he now

entered upon was one calculated to make me forget my own errand and

even to question my own convictions.

The first intimation I received of the curious nature of his

communication was through the following questions, put to him by the

major:

“You are sure this gentleman is identical with the one pointed out to

you last night?”

“Very sure, sir. I can swear to it.”

I omit all evidence of the defect in his speech above mentioned.

“You recognize him positively?”

“Positively. I should have picked him out with the same assurance, if I

had seen him in some other city and in a crowd of as fine-looking

gentlemen as himself. His face made a great impression on me. You see I

had ample time to study it in the few minutes we stood so close

together.”

“So you have said. Will you be kind enough to repeat the circumstance?

I should like the man who has just come in to hear your description of

this scene. Give the action, please. It is all very interesting.”

The stranger glanced inquisitively in my direction, and turned to obey

the superintendent.

“I was returning to my home in Georgetown, on the evening of May the

eleventh, the day of the great tragedy. My wife was ill, and I had been

into town to see a physician and should have gone directly home; but I

was curious to see how high the flood was running—you remember it was

over the banks that night. So I wandered out on the bridge, and came

upon the gentleman about whom you have been questioning me. He was

standing all alone leaning on the rail thus.” Here the speaker drew up

a chair, and, crossing his arms over its back, bent his head down over

them. “I did not know him, but the way he eyed the water leaping and

boiling in a yellow flood beneath was not the way of a curious man like

myself, but of one who was meditating some desperate deed. He was

handsome and well dressed, but he looked a miserable wretch and was in

a state of such complete self-absorption that he did not notice me,

though I had stopped not five feet from his side. I expected to see him

throw himself over, but instead of that, he suddenly raised his head

and, gazing straight before him, not at the heavy current, but at some

vision in his own mind, broke forth in these words, spoken as I had

never heard words spoken before—”

Here the speaker’s stuttering got the better of him and the district

attorney had time to say:

“What were these words? Speak them slowly; we have all the time there

is.”

Instantly the man plucked up heart and, eying us all impressively, was

able to say:

“They were these: ‘She must die! _she must die!_’ No name, but just the

one phrase twice repeated, ‘_She must die!_’ This startled me, and

hardly knowing whether to lay hands on him, or to turn about and run, I

was moving slowly away, when he drew his arms from the rail, like this,

and, still staring into space, added, in the same hard and determined

voice, this one word more, ‘To-night!’; and, wheeling about, passed me

with one blank and wholly unconscious look and betook himself toward

the city. As he went by, his lips opened for the third time. ‘Which

means—’ he cried, between a groan and a shriek, ‘a bullet for her and—’

I wish I had heard the rest, but he was out of my hearing before his

sentence was finished.”

“What time was this?”

“As near half-past five as possible. It was six when I reached home a

few minutes later.”

“Ah, he must have gone to the cemetery after this.”

“I am quite sure of it.”

“Why didn’t you follow the man?” grumbled Durbin.

“It wasn’t my business. He was a stranger and possibly mad. I didn’t

know what to do.”

“What did you do?”

“Went home and kept quiet; my wife was very ill that night and I had my

own cause for anxiety.”

“You, however, read the papers next morning?”

“No, sir, nor for many days. My wife grew constantly worse and for a

week I didn’t leave her, not knowing but that every breath would be her

last. I was dead to everything outside the sick-room and when she grew

better, which was very gradually, we had to take her away, so that I

had no opportunity of speaking of this occurrence to any one till a

week ago, when some remark, published in connection with Mrs. Jeffrey’s

death, recalled that encounter on the bridge. I told a neighbor that I

believed the man I had seen there was Mr. Jeffrey, and we looked up the

papers and ran over them till we came upon his picture. That settled

it, and I could no longer—being free from home anxieties now—hold my

tongue and the police heard—”

“That will do, Mr. Gelston,” broke in the major. “When we want you

again, we will let you know. Durbin, see Mr. Gelston out.”

I was left alone with the major and the district attorney.

There was a moment’s silence, during which my own heart beat so loud

that I was afraid they would hear it. Since taking up Miss Tuttle’s

cause I had never really believed in Mr. Jeffrey’s innocence in spite

of the alibi he had brought forward, and now I expected to hear these

men utter the same conviction. The major was the first to speak.

Addressing the district attorney, he remarked: “This will strengthen

your case very materially. We have proof now that Mrs. Jeffrey’s death

was actually determined upon. If Miss Tuttle had not shot her, he

would. I wonder if it was a relief to him on reaching his door to find

that the deed was done.”

I could not suppress my surprise.

“Miss Tuttle!” I repeated. “Is it so unmistakably evident that Mr.

Jeffrey did not get to the Moore house in time to do the shooting

himself?”

The major gave me a quick look.

“I thought you considered Miss Tuttle the guilty one.”

I felt that the time had come to show my colors.

“I have changed my mind,” said I. “I can give you no good reason for

this; something in the woman herself, I suppose. She does not look nor

act like a criminal. While not desirous of raising myself in opposition

to the judgment of those so greatly my superior in all respects, I have

had this feeling, and I am courageous enough to avow it. And yet, if

Mr. Jeffrey could not have left the cemetery gates and reached the

Moore house in time to fulfil all the conditions of this tragedy, the

case does look black against the woman. She admits to having been there

when the pistol was fired, unless—”

“Unless what? You have something new to tell us. That I have seen ever

since you entered the room. What is it?”

I cast a glance at the door. Should I be able to finish my story before

Durbin returned? I thought it possible, and, though still upset by this

new evidence, which I could now see was not entirely in Miss Tuttle’s

favor, I spoke up with what spirit I might.

“I have just come from spending another night in the Moore house. All

the efforts heretofore made to exhaust its secrets have been founded

upon a theory that has brought us nowhere. I had another in mind, and I

was anxious to test it before resting from all further attempt to solve

this riddle. And it has not failed me. By pursuing a clue apparently so

trivial that I allowed it to go neglected for weeks, I have come upon

the key to the many mysterious crimes which have defiled the library

hearthstone. And where do you think it lies? Not in the hearthstone

itself and not in the floor under the settle; not, in fact, in the

library at all, but in the picture hanging upstairs in the southwest

chamber.”

“The picture! that faded-out sketch, fit only for the garret?”

“Yes. To you and to most people surveying it, it is just what you say

and nothing more. But to the initiated few—pray Heaven they may have

been few—it is writing, conveying secret instructions. The whole

combination of curves which go to make up this sketch is a curious

arrangement of words inscribed with the utmost care, in the smallest of

characters. Viewed with a magnifying glass, the uncertain outlines of a

shadowy face surmounted by a mass of piled-up hair resolve themselves

into lines of writing, the words of which are quite intelligible and

full of grim and unmistakable purpose. I have read those lines; and

what is more, I have transcribed them into plain copy. Will you read

them? They contain a most extraordinary confession; a confession that

was manifestly intended as a warning, but which unfortunately has had

very different results. It may explain the death of the man from

Denver, even if it cast no light upon the other inexplicable features

of the remarkable case we are considering.”

As I spoke I laid open on the table before me the transcription of

which I spoke. Instantly the two men bent over it. When they looked up

again, their countenances showed not excitement only but appreciation;

and in the one minute of triumph which I then enjoyed, all that had

wounded or disturbed me in the past was forgotten.

“You are a man in a thousand,” was the major’s first enthusiastic

comment; at which I was conscious of regretting, with very pardonable

inconsistency, that Durbin had not returned in time to hear these

words.

The major now proposed that we should go at once to the old house. “A

family secret like this does not crop up every day even in a city so

full of surprises as Washington. We will hunt for the spring under the

closet drawers and see what happens, eh? And on our way there”—here he

turned to me “I should like to hear the particulars concerning the

little clue just mentioned. By the way, Mr. Jeffrey’s interest in this

old drawing is now explained. He knew its diabolical secret.”

This was self-evident, and my heart was heavy for Miss Tuttle, who

seemed to be so deep in her brother-in-law’s confidence.

It grew still heavier when Durbin, joining us, added his incredulity to

the air of suspicion assumed by the others. Through all the

explanations I now entered into, I found myself inwardly repeating with

somewhat forced iteration, “I will not believe her guilty under any

circumstances. She carries the look of innocence, and innocent she must

be proved, whatever the result may be to Francis Jeffrey.”

To such an extent had I been influenced by the lofty expression which I

had once surprised on her face.

Had Mr. David Moore been sitting open-eyed behind his vines that

morning, he would have been much surprised to see so many of his

natural enemies intrude on his property at so early an hour. But,

happily, he had not yet risen, and we were able to enter upon our

investigations without being watched or interrupted by him.

Our first move was to go in a body to the southwest chamber, take down

the picture, examine it with a magnifying-glass and satisfy ourselves

that the words I had picked out of its mazy lines were really to be

found there. This done and my veracity established, we next proceeded

to the closet where, according to the instructions embodied in this

picture, the secret spring was to be found by which some unknown and

devilish machinery would be released in the library below.

To my great satisfaction the active part in this experiment was

delegated to me. Durbin continued to be a mere looker-on. Drawing out

the two large drawers from their place at the end of this closet, I set

them aside. Then I hunted for and found the small loophole which we had

been told afforded a glimpse of the library hearthstone; but seeing

nothing through it, I called for a light to be placed in the room

below.

I heard Durbin go down, then the major, and finally, the district

attorney. Nothing could stay their curiosity now, not even the

possibility of danger, which as yet was a lurking and mysterious one.

But when a light shot up from below, and the irregular opening before

me became a loophole through which I could catch a very wide glimpse of

the library beneath, I found that it was not necessary for me to warn

them to keep away from the hearth, as they were all clustered very near

the door—a precaution not altogether uncalled for at so hazardous a

moment.

“Are you ready?” I called down.

“Ready!” rose in simultaneous response from below.

“Then look out!”

Reaching for the spring cleverly concealed in the wall at my right I

vigorously pressed it.

The result was instantaneous. Silently, but with unerring certainty,

something small, round, and deadly, fell plumb from the library ceiling

to where the settle had formerly stood against the hearthstone. Finding

nothing there but vacancy to expend itself upon, it swung about for a

moment on what looked like a wire or a whip-cord, then slowly came to

rest within a foot or so from the floor.

A cry from the horrified officials below was what first brought me to

myself. Withdrawing from my narrow quarters I hastened down to them and

added one more white face to the three I found congregated in the

doorway. In the diabolical ingenuity we had seen displayed, crime had

reached its acme and the cup of human depravity seemed full. When we

had regained in some measure our self-possession, we all advanced for a

closer look at the murderous object dangling before us. We found it to

be a heavy leaden weight painted on its lower end to match the bosses

of stucco-work which appeared at regular intervals in the ornamentation

of the ceiling. When drawn up into place, that is, when occupying the

hole from which it now hung suspended, the portion left to protrude

would evidently bear so small a proportion to its real bulk as to

justify any eye in believing it to be the mate, and the harmless mate,

of all the others.

“It hangs just where the settle stood,” observed Durbin, significantly.

“And just at the point where the cushions invite rest, as the colonel

so suggestively puts it in his strange puzzle of a confession,” added

the district attorney.

“Replace the old seat,” ordered the major, “and let us make sure of

this.”

Ready hands at once grasped it, and, with some effort, I own, drew it

carefully back into position.

“You see!” quoth Durbin.

We did.

“Devilish!” came from the major’s lips. Then with a glance at the ball

which, pushed aside by the seat, now hung over its edge a foot or so

from the floor, he added briskly: “The ball has fallen to the full

length of the cord. If it were drawn up a little—”

“Wait,” I eagerly interposed. “Let me see what I can do with it.”

And I dashed back upstairs and into the closet of “The Colonel’s Own.”

With a single peep down to see if they were still on the watch, I

seized the handle whose position I had made sure of when searching for

the spring, and began to turn; when instantly—so quick was the

response—the long cord stiffened and I saw the ball rise into sight

above the settle top.

“Stop!” called out the major. “Let go and press the spring again.”

I hastened to obey and, though the back of the settle hid the result

from me, I judged from the look and attitude of those below that the

old colonel’s calculations had been made with great exactness, and that

the one comfortable seat on the rude and cumbersome bench had been so

placed that this leaden weight in descending would at the chosen moment

strike the head of him who sat there, inflicting death. That the weight

should be made just heavy enough to produce a fatal concussion without

damaging the skull was proof of the extreme care with which this subtle

apparatus had been contrived. An open wound would have aroused

questions, but a mere bruise might readily pass as a result of the

victim’s violent contact with the furnishings of the hearth toward

which the shocked body would naturally topple. The fact that a modern

jury had so regarded it shows how justified he was in this expectation.

I was expending my wonder on this and on a new discovery which, with a

very decided shock to myself I had just made in the closet, when the

command came to turn the handle again and to keep on turning it till it

would turn no farther.

I complied, but with a trembling hand, and though I did not watch the

result, the satisfaction I heard expressed below was significant of the

celerity and precision with which the weight rose, foot by foot, to the

ceiling and finally slunk snugly and without seeming jar into its lair.

When, a few minutes later, I rejoined those below, I found them all,

with eyes directed toward the cornice, searching for the hole through

which I had just been looking. It was next to imperceptible, so

naturally had it been made to fit in with the shadows of the scroll

work; and even after I had discovered it and pointed it out to them, I

found difficulty in making them believe that they really looked upon an

opening. But when once convinced of this, the district attorney’s

remark was significant.

“I am glad that my name is not Moore.”

The superintendent made no reply; his eye had caught mine, and he had

become very thoughtful.

“One of the two candelabra belonging to the parlor mantel was found

lying on that closet floor,” he observed. “Somebody has entered there

lately, as lately as the day when Mr. Pfeiffer was seated here.”

“Pardon me,” I impetuously cried. “Mr. Pfeiffer’s death is quite

explained.” And, drawing forward my hand, which up to this moment I had

held tight-shut behind my back, I slowly unclosed it before their

astonished eyes.

A bit of lace lay in my palm, a delicate bit, such as is only worn by

women in full dress.

“Where did you find that?” asked the major, with the first show of deep

emotion I have ever observed in him.

My agitation was greater than his as I replied:

“In the rough boarding under those drawers. Some woman’s arm and hand

has preceded mine in stealthy search after that fatal spring. A woman

who wore lace, valuable lace.”

There was but one woman connected with this affair who rightly answered

these conditions. The bride! Veronica Moore.

XXIII.

WORDS IN THE NIGHT

Had I any premonition of the astounding fact thus suddenly and, I may

say, dramatically revealed to us during the weeks I had devoted to the

elucidation of the causes and circumstances of Mrs. Jeffrey’s death? I

do not think so. Nothing in her face, as I remembered it; nothing in

the feeling evinced toward her by husband or sister, had prepared me

for a disclosure of crime so revolting as to surpass all that I had

ever imagined or could imagine in a woman of such dainty personality

and unmistakable culture. Nor was the superintendent or the district

attorney less confounded by the event. Durbin only tried to look wise

and strut about, but it was of no use; he deceived nobody. Veronica

Moore’s real connection with Mr. Pfeiffer’s death,—a death which in

some inscrutable way had in so short a time led to her own,—was an

overwhelming surprise to every one of us.

The superintendent, as was natural, recovered first.

“This throws quite a new light upon the matter,” said he. “Now we can

understand why Mr. Jeffrey uttered that extraordinary avowal overheard

on the bridge: ‘She must die!’ She had come to him with blood on her

hands.”

It seemed incredible, nay more, unreal. I recalled the sweet refined

face turned up to me from the bare boards of this same floor, the

accounts I had read of the vivacity of her spirits and the wild charm

of her manner till the shadow of this old house fell upon her. I

marveled, still feeling myself in the dark, still clinging to my faith

in womankind, still asking to what depths her sister had followed her

in the mazes of crime we were forced to recognize but could not

understand.

Durbin had no such feelings and no such scruples, as was shown by the

sarcastic comment which now left his lips.

“So!” he cried, “we have to do with three criminals instead of two.

Nice family, the Moore-Jeffreys!”

But no one paid any attention to him. Addressing the major, the

district attorney asked when he expected to hear from Denver, adding

that it had now become of the first importance to ascertain the exact

relations existing between the persons under suspicion and the latest

victim of this deadly mechanism.

The major’s answer was abrupt. He had been expecting a report for days.

He was expecting one yet. If it came in at any time, night or day, he

was to be immediately notified. Word might be sent him in an hour, in a

minute.

Were his remarks a prophecy? He had hardly ceased speaking when an

officer appeared with a telegram in his hand. This the major eagerly

took and, noting that it was in cipher, read it by means of the code he

carried in his pocket. Translated, it ran thus:

Result of open inquiry in Denver.

Three brothers Pfeiffer; all well thought of, but plain in their ways

and eccentric. One doing business in Denver. Died June, ’97. One

perished in Klondike, October, same year; and one, by name Wallace,

died suddenly three months since in Washington.

Nothing further gained by secret inquiry in this place.

Result of open inquiry in Owosso.

A man named Pfeiffer kept a store in Owosso during the time V. M.

attended school there. He was one of three brothers, home Denver, name

Wallace. Simultaneously with V. M.’s leaving school, P. broke up

business and at instigation of his brother William, who accompanied

him, went to the Klondike. No especial relation between lady and this

same P. ever noted. V. M. once heard to laugh at his awkward ways.

Result of secret inquiry in Owosso.

V. M. very intimate with schoolmate who has since died. Often rode

together; once gone a long time. This was just before V. M. left school

for good. Date same as that on which a marriage occurred in a town

twenty miles distant. Bride, Antoinette Moore; groom, W. Pfeiffer of

Denver; witness, young girl with red hair. Schoolmate had red hair. Had

V. M. a middle initial, and was that initial A?

We all looked at each other; this last question was one none of us

could answer.

“Go for Mr. Jeffrey at once,” ordered the major, “and let another one

of you bring Miss Tuttle. No word to either of what has occurred and no

hint of their possible meeting here.”