MRS. BASCOM CAPITULATES
‘Since you know about Mrs. Bascom’s hand in my going away, I need not
explain why I left the jail here, Ez.’
The inspector had seated himself on the cot bed in Ruel’s cell as the
latter paced the floor, recounting his experiences on that hasty trip
to Boston.
‘It wasn’t very hard to persuade me, especially as it was a chance to
_do_ something instead of sitting cooped up here. I hoped you would
understand I wasn’t running away.
‘Well, I took a short cut through the woods to the main road, where
I was lucky enough to get picked up by a man who was driving in his
automobile to Boston. We made it in good time, and I started looking
for any record of “Detective King.” I can’t begin to tell you how
many places I----’
‘Don’t try, son. Just skip to the important part,’ interrupted Ezra.
‘That was this morning. Mrs. B. had thought the murder was the work
of some ex-convict, you know, who held a grudge against King as a
detective. I happened to think of those figures in that connection,
wondered if it was possible for them to have been his prison number.
So I went to the Charlestown Jail to check up on them. For some
reason the police in Boston had been very willing to help me in every
way, so got me the proper credentials.’
‘They would. I telephoned ’em that you, as my agent, was to have
clear hoein’.’
‘So that was it!--Well, I found the number in the Rogues’ Gallery all
right, but not what I expected. The convict’s photographs were all
too plainly King!’
‘Hold on, Ruel. It’s easy to be mistaken in photos sometimes.’
‘Don’t think I didn’t _want_ to be, Ez, but the likeness was too
strong and obvious. It was King, younger and under the name of
Jameson, but King beyond a doubt. Then I looked up his record, later
copied parts of it and the newspaper accounts of his trial. You’ll
find it all as I wrote it down.’ He pointed to the papers he had
taken from his pocket, but Sewell scarcely glanced at them.
‘Tell me about it yourself, Ruel, kind of brief like,’ he commanded.
‘It’s not very complicated. Jameson, or King as we knew him, was
in partnership with an older man named Fox. Under cover of a
merchandising brokerage business, it appeared they had been carrying
on some sort of shady work, smuggling or something like that. Finally
the Government got on their trail through some deal in jewels, and
laid a plot to capture the whole gang red-handed. They did get many
of the lesser agents, and when they entered the partners’ office
suddenly, they found King bending over Fox, who was dead--stabbed.
The knife was in King’s hand.
‘King--I can’t think of him as Jameson--was tried and all the
evidence established his guilt, though he maintained he was innocent,
even denied all knowledge of the illegal deals and so on. When his
lawyer saw how the verdict was going, he evidently persuaded King to
change his plea to self-defense. The sentence was finally given for
manslaughter.
‘After twelve years in jail, King was pardoned and seemed to have
disappeared. That was eight years before he came to New York.’
‘An’ he was wealthy then, eh?’ muttered Sewell, half to himself.
‘No, that was one of the ameliorating circumstances to his release.
His partner seemed to have kept most of the money, and it was never
found.--Oh, I don’t believe King was guilty in any way. The money he
made was his own, because he was a good business man and writer of
fiction. He was too kind, honest, and sincere a man for such things.’
‘Seems so,’ echoed Sewell, ‘but it looks now as if no one would ever
know for certain.--But see here. His partner, anyway, was dealin’
shady. That means he must have had a lot of others helpin’ him.
See the point? It might have been one of ’em, one of his gang that
followed King an’ tried to blackmail him--finally killed him. That’s
logical, even if the rest ain’t.’
‘But such a man could not have been one of his guests, Ez.’
‘Yes, he could. If King was innocent, he wouldn’t have known any
of ’em, the gang, see? This man might have made friends with him
on purpose.--Well, anyway, I guess that proves the motive, certain
sure--it was blackmail or sort of revenge. But the question still is,
who was the man?’
‘You haven’t discovered anything since I left?’
‘Yep, quite some, an’ I guess there’s more comin’ right quick.’
‘How? What?’
‘Never mind now. Guess I’ll wait a bit an’ maybe tell it all in a
bunch.’
‘At least, Ez, tell me about Basil. What was he doing in that cell? I
was dumfounded when he first spoke, though I realized it was a sort
of confession he was making.’
‘Believe what he said?’
‘Yes, I do. It explains everything he did. He’s weak, capable of
desperate means to protect his interests, but I’m certain not of
murder. I don’t admire him exactly----’
‘Nor he you!’ chuckled Sewell, then recounted the facts of Basil’s
temporary confinement. ‘But here I am gaddin’ as if I had nothin’
else to do when Ellen B.’s waitin’ for me.--You just rest up a bit,
Ruel. You’ve earned it, I guess. Only don’t go listenin’ to any more
Eves’ or Ellens’ temptin’s, see? Jailbreakin’ ain’t no joke, Ruel,
an’ I’m kind of pergerin’ myself, coverin’ your trail. Guess I ain’t
makin’ no mistake, though.’
With this injunction, Sewell went out, locking the door behind him,
climbed into his automobile and drove rapidly to King’s house. Mrs.
Bascom, having heard his noisy approach, met him on the steps. Her
kindly face was rather strained and pale, but her eyes did not falter
as they met his.
‘Afternoon to you, Ellen B. I was kind of held up a bit gettin’ here,
for which I apologize, seein’ as it ain’t right to keep a woman
waitin’--especially you.’
To his surprise, she did not make any sarcastic retort such as he had
expected.
‘Ezra Sewell, I’ve got a lot to tell you,’ she answered seriously.
‘Let’s go out on the lawn a bit.’
Her glance about was eloquent. Plainly, she feared being overheard,
so chose the lawn where no one could approach without being seen.
‘How’s Miss Hawley to-day?’ remarked Ezra as they walked toward the
elm tree in the center of the grass plot.
‘Worse. She’s in a coma, and Dr. New is afraid it may be serious.’
‘You mean she’s really sick?’
‘Yes. And it’s all my fault.’
‘Shucks, Ellen B. Don’t believe it for a minute. You’d never hurt a
fly--even if you got a chance to swat it.’
She did not respond to this gibe, but faced him, tense yet hesitant.
Twice she tried to speak and failed. Her eyes dropped nervously from
his face and her hands fluttered aimlessly about the pleats of her
dress.
‘Ezra, I’ve been a--a foolish woman, and it’s not easy to start
tellin’ on myself.’ Unconsciously she slurred her words and brought
them out in awkward breaths.
‘Gosh, Ellen, if that’s all that’s troublin’ you, let me help out
a bit.--You kind of think I don’t know much about this affair, eh?
Well, you ain’t the only one of that opinion, an’ I’m glad of it.
That an’ lettin’ others do a lot of talkin’ has learned me things.
Land knows there’s lots I wish I knew--some as I hope you’ll tell me
now--but still I do know perhaps more than you calculate.
‘For instance, I know Basil stole those papers an’ why, also that
he probably is holdin’ somethin’ over Sylvia’s head. Then again, I
know about the judge, pokin’ into ladies’ rooms.--Oh, so that ain’t
news to you, eh?--Well, here’s another. Ruel’s back an’ what he found
about King helps some. Then there’s the paper-knife as was used to
kill King. I know----’
He stopped short at the audible gasp and the strangely awed
expression that came into Mrs. Bascom’s face.
‘Ezra Sewell, you--you mean to say you know--I----’
He smiled at her confusion, but not unkindly.
‘There’s ways of findin’ out things, Ellen B., an’ I’ve found ’em!
But I guess if you an’ me sort of get together on some of ’em,
instead of pullin’ crosswise, it might help a bit, eh?’
‘Ezra Sewell, if I’d only known this before----What a smart Alec
I’ve been!’ She was almost sniveling with the sudden relief of her
wrought-up emotions.
‘There--there, it’s all right, Ellen B. I couldn’t understand you
for--for keepin’ back from me, b-but I never did suspect you of no
wrong nor nothin’ like that.’ Sewell was so embarrassed that he
stuttered as he clumsily tried to soothe her.
‘I’ve been a fool--a fool! And to think you were trustin’ me all the
time too, while I was only trying to be a better detective than you.’
Ezra burst into a laugh that he could not control.
‘A detective, Ellen? Well, I never! If that don’t explain most
everythin’ in a word. So that was why you was so clever an’ smart
at findin’ things, cookin’ up ideas an’ concealin’ information. A
she-detective! An’ you succeeded too. Why, look at that inspiration
about King’s past life, an’ findin’ the murderer’s weapon----’
‘That was only because I happened to come on Sylvia first. Oh, I
should never have kept it from you, only I thought--I----’
‘You thought I was kind of passin’ out on the job. Still, I heard you
defendin’ me once, Ellen, an’ I don’t hold nothin’ against you--not
if you tell me everythin’ now.’
‘I will, Ezra. It’ll be easy and a relief.’ She was recovering her
poise rapidly and once more faced him steadily, alert and eager.
‘You’ve got the knife, then?’
He nodded silently.
‘I thought--I hoped so, only it didn’t seem like you to turn my whole
house upside down. I suppose, not knowing just where it was----’
‘What’s that? Guess you’d better begin at the beginnin’, Ellen. I
got the knife ’cause I guessed where it was, but if your house has
been searched, that wasn’t my doin’.--Let’s take one thing at a time,
startin’--well, wherever you began detectin’.’
Mrs. Bascom needed no further encouragement. With obvious relief
in her tone she began her story, relating everything in detail and
speaking rapidly. She recapitulated her share in the discovery of
the murder, told of finding Sylvia and the knife, repeated Sylvia’s
description of her accident, what she had seen at the time of the
robbery, and the overheard conversation between Sylvia and Basil.
At this point, Sewell interrupted for a moment to tell of his recent
conversation with Basil and the latter’s confession.
An account of Judge Brant’s search of the two women’s rooms, the
discovery that the knife had disappeared and Sylvia’s most recent
confession ended Mrs. Bascom’s revelations. Sewell capped them with
the judge’s explanation for his search of the rooms.
‘I should say, ma’am, your career as a detective has been a mighty
strenuous one,’ continued Sewell. ‘An’ it’s been mighty useful too.
Some ways it looks better, after all--not hearin’ all that till now,
I mean--because it puts everythin’ plain an’ unconfusin’.’
‘I don’t see anything very plain about it, Ezra. All it does is clear
Sylvia and Ruel, who never needed it.’
‘An’ some others, too, Ellen B. Yourself, for instance. Oh, you
needn’t jump like a scared pullet. I don’t mean I suspected you of
murder, but I did of knowin’ too many things an’ keepin’ mum about
’em. Guess you gave me reason enough, too.’
‘Then why didn’t you ask me outright about them? I’d have told you if
I’d known how much you’d found out already.’
‘Would you?’ responded Ezra quizzically. But he did not wait for
an answer as he ruminated aloud, ‘Now, then, let’s sort of arrange
things a little. Sylvia an’ you are out of it--entire. So is Ruel, in
my opinion. Basil Stacey--well, I kind of think he told about all he
knew, an’ I don’t somehow believe he had spunk enough to do anythin’
worse than thievin’ to protect his own hide. That leaves Judge Brant
an’ Dr. New on the scene--unless it was one of the other guests, an’
I doubt that.
‘The judge, now. He’s appeared keen on findin’ the murderer, an’
the things he’s been doin’, when he explained ’em, seem reasonable
enough. The doctor, of course, never was involved, except for his
bein’ on the spot like. Yet it’s got to be one of those men, Ellen
B. The oiled door, the pieces of cement on the window an’ floor, an’
all the careful arrangements prove it was one of the guests. Add the
motive we’ve just turned up--thanks to you, ma’am--an’--well, common
sense, an’ intuition, an’ everythin’, an’ it comes out Stacey or
Brant or New.’
‘Explain the motive. You said Ruel was back, but you haven’t told me
what he found.’
‘It was kind of a shock, Ellen.’
‘I know. But it seemed the only way. I could not go to Boston myself,
and you----’
‘Oh, I don’t mean your sendin’ Ruel there. That was clever of you,
Ellen, but kind of obvious--the way you was so carefully an’ loosely
tied up when you didn’t have to be at all, bein’ locked in the
cell.--No, I mean the facts he found were a shock.’
Briefly he recounted what he had just learned from Ruel, while Mrs.
Bascom breathed in quick gasps.
‘His life as we know it,’ finished Ezra, ‘don’t seem to gibe with
such a history, an’ yet----’
‘Of course it does,’ she interrupted with quick sympathy. ‘He never
was guilty to begin with--he couldn’t have been. It was all his
scheming partner and his gang. But King was just the sort of man
to take everything on his shoulders--give himself and his money to
others in a mistaken sense of restitution to society or whatever
you’re a mind to call it. Besides, it may have been his partner’s
hidden money he did it with.’
‘By gosh a’mighty! I bet you’re right at that,’ muttered Sewell,
impressed with the logic of the idea. ‘It ain’t no use denyin’ it,
Ellen B., we ought to team up together--when it comes to detectin’, I
mean,’ he added somewhat hastily and with a touch of embarrassment.
‘Anyway, that number bein’ written on the paper in his pocket shows
some one knew about his past trouble, an’ that some one must have
been among the guests. It seems logical King might never have known
him, an’ that all goes to prove it was one of this partner’s gang,
seems to me.’
‘It would explain a lot, but how are we going to tell which one it
was? I don’t see that all this brings us any nearer finding the man
who killed King.’
‘Wait a minute. What about your house bein’ all upset? I didn’t do
it, so who did an’ why? That’s the final proof, see? One of these
here men did it, ’cause he’s handy an’ knows what’s goin’ on all the
time.’
‘You mean it was some one after the knife?’
‘That or somethin’ connected with the murder as he thought you had.
Basil, now, he seems quite a breaker into things. Do you suppose he’d
have done it for any reason?’
Mrs. Bascom stared thoughtfully at Sewell for a moment.
‘It’s possible. He was away from the house a good deal yesterday, but
if he didn’t commit the murder, as it seems likely, why should he go
after the knife?’
‘You’re sure you never mentioned to no one where you’d kept it?’
‘Never, not even to Sylvia.’
‘Well, that seems to end it. There’s still one chance left, though.
I kind of--well, saw that you was concealin’ somethin’ in your dress
that day you had the knife. It’s possible he or some one might have
guessed the same thing as I did, an’ looked for it just to give it
over to me.’
Again they seemed to have argued in a circle, but it did not worry
Ezra. It was not the first time he had struggled on after apparently
baffling defeat. He started once more to build a sound case against
Basil, only to find it could be knocked down too easily. In passing,
he mentioned Sylvia’s name and this recalled her condition to Mrs.
Bascom.
‘I’m so glad she told me everything before this relapse.--You don’t
think her condition is serious, do you?’
‘Not bein’ a doctor, I can’t say, Ellen.’
‘I mean, judging from what you saw of her, from your talk with her,
you’d not think her mind affected seriously or anything, would you?’
‘Far from it, Ellen. She was upset in her mind--an’ who wouldn’t have
been with what we now know was in it--but I couldn’t get nothin’
out of her except what she had a mind to tell. I could see she was
thinkin’ rapid, an’ she dodged certain questions quite neat--like you
did--but all that, I should say, showed she was far from sick.’
‘But she is now.--Ezra, I’m worried. If I helped to cause her relapse
as Dr. New said----’
‘He’s got to blame some one, ain’t he, an’ you was handy. A patient
under his care gets worse; whose fault is it? Certainly not
his!--Shucks, Ellen, if her mind’s affected like he says, that wasn’t
your fault. Why, you couldn’t get into her mind like a germ--nor
influence it much up to lately, as far as I can make out.’
This comforted Mrs. Bascom considerably, so that when they turned
toward the house, she felt quite buoyant and ready to throw herself
into the work once more. First she went to look at Sylvia, but found
her condition unchanged. The doctor had left some medicine to be
taken immediately if she stirred, and this stood ready by the side
of her bed. Inexpertly Mrs. Bascom tried to feel Sylvia’s pulse,
but gave up after several attempts when each count proved so widely
divergent from the last. She took a book and sat by the window
without opening it, mulling over the news which Ezra had imparted to
her, but her sense of relief at having shifted the responsibility to
Ezra’s shoulders was so great that she could not think clearly.
In the meantime, the inspector had driven straight to Mrs. Bascom’s
house. She had mentioned the fact that the key was no longer under
the mat, so he had borrowed it from her. Now he entered boldly, ran
up a shade to let in the light and began a search of his own.
Everything was still in confusion, as Mrs. Bascom had not
tried to straighten up, but his search was fruitless. Taking a
magnifying-glass from the parlor table, he studied the knobs and
edges of the drawers that had been opened, scrutinized parts of the
woodwork, table-tops, chairs, but after doing this in three rooms,
he gave up the task. There were no finger-prints, only faint blurs
here and there. Obviously the intruder had worn gloves, just as the
murderer had!
Leaving the lower rooms, Sewell ascended the stairs and opened a door
at the end of the hall. The room was stuffy with the odor of musk,
which, he found, proceeded from a broken vial in the bureau drawer.
It seemed to warn him that he was trespassing on no man’s ground, and
he flushed to himself as he rather hastily resumed his search. It was
in vain. Nowhere was there a clue as to the identity of the intruder.
Disappointed, he carefully drew down the shade on the lower floor
room again, locked the door, and left the house, muttering, ‘Now,
what in time was he after, I’d like to know? There’s one thing
certain, he wasn’t a burglar, since nothin’ seemed to have been
taken, an’ he did know what he was about, wearin’ gloves.’
At the jail, Sewell went straight to the safe and took out his
meager store of clues one by one. These he carried into Ruel’s cell
and spread out on the cot. Ruel started forward at the sight of the
knife, but fell back again at a sign from the inspector.
‘Don’t you touch a thing, son. You just listen to me with both ears
forward an’ I’m goin’ to tell you everythin’, just in the order it
happened, whether it was me or Ellen B. or any one else as really
found it out. They say two heads are better than one. Well, let’s
see if three is better yet. An’, mind you, not an interruption till
I finish. This is only part for your benefit an’ most to hear myself
tell everythin’ I know, see?’
Ruel nodded mutely, his eyes wavering back and forth between the
clues and Sewell’s serious face. Then the latter began, speaking in
a slow, emotionless drawl, picturing everything that had occurred as
if some third person had shared in or watched it, detail by detail.
Several times Ruel choked back an exclamation or question with
difficulty, but he did not speak until Sewell had ceased talking.
Even then he kept silent, for there seemed nothing he could add, no
solution for the mystery he could offer.
‘Well?’ interrogated Sewell at length. ‘Am I to take it a third head
is as befoozled as two of ’em?’
‘At least it all goes to show one thing,’ began Ruel hopefully. ‘It
proves Sylvia is innocent, was only----’
‘My soul an’ body!’ cried Sewell thunderously. ‘I might have known
it. When I take pains to lay the whole thing open before you, ask you
to help me an’ treat you confidential with every bloomin’ detail, all
you’ve got to say is that Sylvia’s innocent!’
‘But I did listen carefully, Ez,’ said Ruel, abashed. ‘I followed
every word, only I don’t see as it clears up anything except her and
Mrs. Bascom’s attitudes. I don’t mean----’
‘Oh, well, I should have expected it,’ said Sewell philosophically, a
twinkle creeping into the corners of his eyes, though his frown did
not relax. ‘It was the same way with her--sayin’ as she’d done it all
for your sake an’ talkin’ to Ellen B. an’ tellin’ her about lyin’
an’ falsifyin’ things just because she--because of you.’
‘Did she say that, Ez?’ pleaded Ruel, seizing him by the arm in his
eagerness.
‘Let go my arm! What you tryin’ to do, bust it clean off with your
sledgehammer hand?--There. That’s better.--Of course she said it, an’
probably a lot more things Ellen an’ I’d blush to repeat.--Hey, where
do you think you’re goin’ now?’
‘To see Sylvia!’
‘No, you ain’t, young man. You stay right here an’ act sensible.’
‘Sensible? That’s exactly what I’m doing.’
‘Hump.--Look here, son. She’s sleepin’ an’ needs the rest. She’s plum
worn out lyin’ for you,’ reasoned Sewell, concealing the seriousness
of her rest, for he knew such knowledge would drive Ruel straight to
her side. ‘You don’t want to make her any worse, do you?--Well, then,
wait till to-morrow, anyway. Guess one day more or less won’t make no
difference to you two.’
‘That’s all you know about it,’ muttered Ruel, but he subsided
restlessly on a corner of the cot. A moment later he was on his feet,
grasping Sewell’s hand and wringing it until it brought a yell of
pain from the inspector.
‘Let go of me, you young ox,’ he bellowed. ‘I’ll have to arrest you
for assault an’ battery too, if you don’t leave me be.’
‘But, Ez, I’ve got to tell you how much I----’
‘No, you ain’t. I won’t listen to you. I’ve got enough on my mind
now, without havin’ to listen to--well, to what you’ve got to say.’
Sewell swept the clues up with one hand, and almost ran from the
room, kicking the door shut behind him violently to hide his chuckles.
His smile faded rapidly, however, as he locked the articles in the
safe once more, then sat down at his desk, gazing speculatively at
his little list of suspects with the comments he had noted opposite
each name.
‘He ain’t fallen into a trap of his own makin’ yet. Now I wonder if
he will--or have I got to set one for him?--The trouble is, I don’t
know exactly how to bait it, seein’ as I ain’t certain sure which
one he is. But he’s gettin’ nervous an’ more darin’, an’ whichever
he is, that’s somethin’. Sooner or later truth’ll come out, only if
Ellen an’ me could only push it along a mite faster.--Detective Ellen
Bascom an’ Inspector Ezra Sewell----’
He chuckled, then became pensively silent.