A MYSTIFYING TELEGRAM
Reaching Furmville early Sunday morning, Bristow went straight to his
bungalow, where Mattie had breakfast waiting for him.
"You is sholy some big man now, Mistuh Bristow!" she informed him. "Sence
you been gawn, folks done made it a habit to drive by hyuh jes' foh de
chanct uv seem' you."
Before the day was over, he found that this was true. And he liked it. He
spent a great deal of his time on the front porch, finding it far from
unpleasant to be regarded as a second Sherlock Holmes.
Late in the afternoon his Cincinnati friend, Overton, called on him,
puffing and gasping for breath as he climbed the steps. Bristow was glad
to see him; it afforded him an opportunity to discuss his success. He did
not try to delude himself in that regard; he was proud of what he had
accomplished--rightfully proud, he told himself--and pleased with his
plans for the future.
"Gee whiz!" the fat man panted. "This hill is something fierce. It's only
your sudden dash into the limelight that drags me up here."
"You behold"--Bristow softened his statement with a deprecating
laugh--"Mr. Lawrence Bristow, a finished, honest-to-heaven detective,
a criminologist."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm going to make it my profession. I'm starting out as a professional
detective."
Overton burst into bubbling laughter.
"That's rich!" he exclaimed. "You'd never in the world make good at it.
Why, Bristow, you're lame; you've a crooked nose; that heavy, overhanging
lip of yours--those things would enable any crook to spot you a mile
off." He laughed again. "I'd like to see you shadowing some foxy
second-story worker!"
"I said 'a consulting detective'," Bristow corrected him. "That shadowing
business is for the hired man, the square-toed, bull-necked cops. I'll
work only as the directing head, the brains of the investigations."
"Oh, that's different," said Overton, at once conciliatory. "That's
nearer real sense. Big money in it, isn't there?"
"Yes. I'm not an eleemosynary institution yet."
Overton mopped his fat cheeks.
"Ah, me!" he sighed. "We never know what's ahead of us, do we? A year ago
you were dubbing around in Cincinnati trying to sell real estate and
working out crime problems on paper--and here you are now, a big man.
It's hard to believe."
"It is, however, a very acceptable fact."
"No doubt, no doubt," assented the fat man.
On Overton's heels came the chief of police. After getting a minute
recital of what had happened in Washington and Baltimore, he agreed that
Braceway was only setting up straw men for the pleasure of knocking them
down.
"Even if there is something mysterious in Morley's conduct, in what
occurred in Baltimore," said the chief, "it can't do away with the
open-and-shut fact that Perry did the murder."
"Of course," Bristow commented. "But what's the news with you?"
"For one thing, Perry gave us last night what he calls a confession. In
it he says he did tell Lucy Thomas he knew where he could get money 'or
something just as good'; he did go to Number Five in a more or less
drunken condition; and he got as far as the front door.
"There, he says, he thought he heard a noise across the road from him,
and he lost his nerve. He tiptoed down the steps and went away, passing
in between Number Five and Number Seven. He ran all the way back to
Lucy's house, threw down the key he had got from her, and then went
to his own rooming-house. He says he stayed there the rest of the night."
"Is that all?"
"That's all."
"How about the lavalliere? Wasn't it found under his window? The papers
said so."
"Yes; in the grass in the yard. But he denies knowing anything about it."
"Of course! And his confession is nothing but a confirmation of the case
against him."
"Exactly. He seems to want to hang himself. And he'll do it. The grand
jury meets next Thursday. He'll be indicted then, and tried two weeks
later."
"What are the people here saying about Braceway's bitterness against
Morley? Anything?"
"Yes. I'd meant to tell you about that. Some of the gossip hits Withers
pretty hard. They can't understand what's behind this persecution of
Morley after it's been proved that Perry did the murder. You've seen
hints of it in the papers.
"And it looks queer. Some say Withers is guilty, out-and-out guilty, and
afraid the case against Perry won't hold good. So, they say, he wants to
get a case against Morley."
"A sort of second line of defense?"
"I reckon so. But, then, there are others saying right now that Morley
was mixed up in some sort of scandal for which Withers wants revenge.
That's what you said at the very start. Remember?"
Bristow laughed softly.
"Yes; I had that idea, and I've reasoned it out. On the way to
Washington, and after we got there, I saw that Braceway wasn't entirely
frank with me. You know how a man can feel a thing like that. He gets it
by intuition.
"And it worried me. Having handled the case here, I didn't want him to
spring some brand new angle which possibly, in some way, might make me
look like a fool.
"I puzzled over the thing a whole lot. What was it he was after without
letting me in on it? The night we talked to Morley in the station house,
I got it. We were in a cab at the time, a lucky thing, because, when it
burst upon me, I narrowly escaped hysterics. The thing came to me like an
inspiration.
"Braceway was afraid Morley knew something detrimental to Withers and
would spring it under questioning. Understand now: it wasn't directly
connected with the murder, but something that would make it pretty hot
for Withers. And here was the laugh: while Morley didn't know it, I did.
Braceway had made the trip to gag Morley, to see that he didn't uncover
something which, after all, Morley didn't know--and I did!
"It was this: about nine months ago Mrs. Withers, while in Washington,
got a lawyer, the firm of Dutton & Dutton, to draw up for her the
necessary papers for suing Withers for a divorce. In these documents she
set forth in so many words that her husband had treated her with the
utmost brutality, so much so that she lived daily in danger of death
while under his roof.
"She regarded him, she swore, as capable of murdering her at any time.
Now, do you see? If that had gotten into the newspapers, if Morley had
known of it through Maria Fulton and had blurted it out, no power on
earth could have kept down the very reasonable assumption that Withers
had had a hand in his wife's death--or, at least, had regarded it with
complaisance.
"No wonder I laughed, was it? But I said nothing about it to Braceway. I
couldn't have explained to him how I knew it, although the tip came to me
straight enough. And, as there's no earthly chance of Withers having been
implicated in the crime, why worry about it?
"I merely laughed and--kept quiet."
Greenleaf had listened in great solemnity to this amusing recital.
"Maybe you're right," he said. "But Withers has done some funny things."
"What things?"
"His wife was buried in Atlanta Thursday morning. He immediately left
Atlanta, and hasn't been seen or heard of since--a sharp contrast to old
Fulton. He got back here early Friday morning and came up to Number Five.
They're going to keep that bungalow."
"When did Withers leave Atlanta?"
"Thursday morning, right after the funeral. Another thing: he's heels
over head in debt."
"Well, what about it? What are you driving at?" Bristow asked,
perceptibly irritable.
"I'm not driving at anything. What's it to us anyway? It stimulates this
ugly talk. That's all."
Bristow was doing some quick thinking. If Withers had left Atlanta
early Thursday morning, he might have reached Washington by Friday
afternoon--and gone to Baltimore! But did he? And did Braceway know of it
and keep it to himself?
He recalled that Braceway, during their breakfast together in Washington,
had said:
"Get one thing straight in your mind, Bristow. Any man I find mixed up in
this murder I'm going to turn over to the police. If I thought George
Withers had killed his wife, I'd hand him over so fast it would make your
head swim. You may not believe that, but I would--in a second!"
Had that been a prophecy? Was Withers in Baltimore at two-thirty Friday
afternoon? Could he have been fool enough to pawn anything? Or did he go
there in the hope of incriminating Morley further? All these things were
within the realm of possibility, but hardly credible. Braceway might have
known of them, and he might not.
Abrahamson, he remembered, had put it into Braceway's head, against
Braceway's own desire, that the man with the gold tooth and Withers
resembled each other. But nobody believed that. It would be futile to
consider it.
The chief, as if reading his thoughts, gave more information:
"Abrahamson, the loan-shark, came to my office yesterday; wanted to know
where he could reach Braceway by wire. He evidently knew something and
wouldn't tell me. Said he wired yesterday morning to Braceway in
Washington, but the telegraph company reported 'no delivery'--couldn't
locate him. I wonder what the Jew knows."
"It's too much for me." Bristow dismissed the question carelessly, but
immediately flared up peevishly: "What's getting into these fellows? They
act like fools, each of them, Morley and Withers, following Perry's lead
and trying to have themselves arrested! But Braceway--if he wasn't in
Washington, he must be on his way back here. We'll soon have his last say
on the case."
"All the same," said Greenleaf, "if I were in that husband's place, I'd
stay away from here. The talk's too bitter; worse here among the
Manniston Road people than anywhere else."
"Well, what of it?"
"It wouldn't be the first instance of how easy it is for an innocent man
to be--well, hurt."
"Oh, that sort of thing is out of the question, absurd."
"Never mind! I'd stay away. That's what I'd do."
It was almost dark when the chief of police took his departure. Bristow
sat watching the last crimson light fade over the mountains. The dim
electric, a poor excuse for a street lamp, had flashed on in front of
No. 4. The shadows grew deeper and deeper; there was no breeze; the oaks
along the roadside and in the backyards became still, black plumes above
the bungalows.
Manniston Road was wrapped in darkness. The silence was broken, even at
this early hour, only by the distant, faint screech of street-car wheels
against the rails, or the far sound of an automobile horn down in the
town, or the rattle of a sick man's cough on one of the sleeping porches.
There was something uncanny, Bristow thought, in the velvet blackness and
the heavy silence.
He got up and went into the living room, turning on the lights. The
night, the stillness, had affected him. Perhaps, he thought, Withers
after all would do well to give Furmville a wide berth. If disorganized
rumour grew into positive accusation----
And what of himself, Bristow? He had run down the guilty man, had
discovered and hooked together the facts that made retribution almost an
accomplished thing. Could he have been mistaken, entirely wrong? Would
public opinion turn also against him and say he had enmeshed an innocent
negro instead of bringing to punishment a jealousy-maddened husband?
Was there a chance that, in condemning Withers, they would destroy his
reputation for brilliant work?
Pshaw! He shrugged his shoulders. He was worse than the gossiping women,
letting himself conjure up weird and incredible ideas. There was not a
weak place, not an illogical point, in the case he had disclosed against
Carpenter. He had won. His prestige was assured. Far from questioning his
work, they ought to thank him for----
The reverie was interrupted by the telephone bell. He took down the
receiver and shouted "Hello!" as if he resented the call. His irritation
showed what a tremendous amount of nervous energy he had expended in the
last six days.
"Western Union speaking," said a man's voice. "Telegram for Mr. Lawrence
Bristow, nine Manniston Road."
"All right. This is Bristow. Read it to me."
"Message is dated today, Washington, D. C.--'Mr. Lawrence Bristow, nine
Manniston Road, Furmville, N. C. See Encyclopaedia Britannica, volume
one, page five hundred and six, second column, line fifteen to line
seventeen, and page five hundred and seven, second column, line seventeen
to line twenty-three.' Signed 'S. S. Braceway,' Do you get that?"
"No! Wait a minute," he called out sharply. "Let me get a pencil and take
it down."
He did so, verifying the numbers by having the operator repeat the
message a third time. When he had hung up the receiver, he sat staring at
what he had written. It was like so much Greek to him.
"What's it all about?" he puzzled. "Is it one of Braceway's jokes?"
Then he remembered that Braceway was not that kind of a joker. He looked
at his watch. He had no encyclopaedia, and it was now a quarter to
eleven, too late to ring up anybody and ask the absurd favour of having
extracts from an encyclopaedia read to him over the telephone. Besides,
it might be something he would prefer to keep to himself.
He would wait until morning and go to the public library where he could
look up the references with no questions asked. He was annoyed by the
necessity of delay, angry with Braceway. He studied the numbers again,
and allowed himself the rare luxury of an outburst of vari-coloured
profanity.
The idea uppermost in his mind was that the telegram had to do with
Withers--or could it be something about Morley?
In his bed on the sleeping porch, he looked out at the black plumes of
the trees. The silence seemed now neither sinister nor oppressive. All
that was sinister was in the past; had ended the night of the murder; and
Carpenter would go to the chair for it--sure.
And yet, if he were Withers, he would not come back to Manniston Road.
Nobody could foresee what Braceway might imagine and exaggerate, even
if it indicted and condemned his closest friend.