“THE MOVING FINGER WRITES--”
A HEARTRENDING scream broke from Millicent, and running to Noyes she
flung herself at his feet.
“Alan, you never did it!” she protested vehemently. “You know you never
did it.”
“Don’t,” he pleaded, grasping her hand weakly as the men helped him to
the leather lounge. Once seated, he turned to Mitchell. “Take down what
I say,” he commenced. “Miss Porter and I quarreled Monday evening, just
before dinner, and I threatened to kill Brainard--”
“Why?” asked Mitchell as he paused.
Noyes avoided looking at anyone in particular. “Blind fury,” he
admitted faintly. “I’ve been like that from a boy, whenever I couldn’t
have my own way. I had just heard that Brainard was to marry the girl I
loved--” His voice shook and he broke off abruptly.
Mrs. Porter rose; she had aged perceptibly. “I tried my best to
shield you, Alan--I can never forget all you have done for my son; my
gratitude--” She could not control her voice and paused, then resumed,
more slowly: “Millicent would not trust me, would not confide in me.
Fearing her diary, in which she had been foolish enough to betray her
growing affection for you, Alan, and in which she mentioned you had
threatened to kill Bruce, would establish a motive for the crime if the
detectives found the diary, I burned it.” She shuddered. “Remember,
Alan, you had run away--”
Noyes eyed her hopelessly. “There was nothing left for me to do but
to go. As soon as my bag was packed I telephoned to my cousin, Mason
Galbraith, who owns an estate across the river, and he met me at the
wharf with his motor boat. I spent two days with him, but I had to come
back to see--” He sighed and looked significantly at Mitchell. The
pain of his wound and his conflicting emotions were wearing down his
strength, and he felt that he could endure no more. “That is all, I
think.”
“Just a moment.” Anthony stepped forward briskly. “Kindly answer a few
questions. Why did you try to kill yourself in the cabin and where did
you get your revolver?”
“I was despondent, discouraged when I left the court house, and went
into a shop in Alexandria and purchased a revolver while Wyndham stayed
in court to engage a lawyer.”
“Had you been to the cabin before?” shooting a swift glance at him.
“Were you familiar with its contents?”
“I have passed the cabin on several of my rambles through the woods,
but never had been inside it. As I went by the cabin I saw the door was
insecurely fastened and went in.”
“Did you find Dr. Thorne in the cabin?”
“No.” Beverly Thorne, who had been scrutinizing each person in the
room, his gaze resting longest on Vera, who avoided looking at him,
could not repress a smile as he saw Anthony’s chagrin. “No one was in
the cabin but myself,” continued Noyes. “The stillness of the place got
on my nerves, and I drew out my revolver--” He stopped and tried to
withdraw his hand from Millicent’s detaining clasp. “I heard someone
approaching the cabin and darted behind the screen, not caring to meet
anyone--then a shot startled me, and my revolver went off almost
simultaneously, and my aim was poor--” His attempt at a smile was
ghastly.
His companions were drinking in his words as they stood in a semicircle
about the lounge on which Millicent had sunk beside Noyes. Mitchell,
who was across from Thorne, saw him watching Vera, and turned his
attention to her, but Anthony’s next words riveted his thoughts again
on Noyes.
“You say you heard a shot, Dr. Noyes?” questioned Anthony. “From which
direction did the shot come?”
“From outside the cabin,” promptly. “It was somewhat muffled.”
“You are sure it was not fired in the cabin?”
“I am.”
Anthony turned bluntly to Thorne. “I guess that lets you out of _one_
charge--you didn’t shoot Dr. Noyes, but--we still have to establish the
identity of ‘Gentleman Charlie,’ the counterfeiter.”
Thorne eyed the Secret Service agent in surprise mixed with amusement,
but before he could reply Mitchell addressed him briskly.
“Suppose you tell me, Dr. Thorne, why Bruce Brainard stopped to see you
on Monday evening before coming here, and why you never spoke of his
visit.”
“Brainard had an attack of vertigo on the way here, and, meeting Cato,
asked to be directed to the nearest physician,” replied Thorne. “So
Cato brought him to me.”
Millicent, who had listened to Noyes’ statements in dumb agony, looked
up at Thorne. “Bruce told me that he had stopped to see you, and
Tuesday morning when I discovered Bruce lying in bed with his throat
cut and recognized the razor, I--I--rushed to the telephone to ask you
to come over, but Vera came and frightened me away before I got you.”
Noyes struggled to sit up. Millicent’s statement had caught him off
guard.
“You discovered Brainard’s murder on Tuesday morning?” he asked
incredulously. “You went back to his bedroom again?”
Mitchell was the first to grasp the significance of Noyes’ remark.
“What’s this?” he demanded. “What do you mean to insinuate--that Miss
Porter was in Bruce Brainard’s bedroom on Monday night?”
“She was,” responded a voice from the doorway, and Wyndham, spinning
around, saw Dorothy Deane advancing into the room. She looked
desperately ill and staggered rather than walked. “Millicent was seen
in Bruce’s bedroom by her brother Craig,” Dorothy added.
Her listeners eyed her in astonishment too deep for expression. Wyndham
was the first to recover himself. “Come with me, dear,” he said
soothingly. “You are ill, delirious.”
Dorothy shook off Wyndham’s detaining hand and walked over to
Millicent. “Your brother saw you enter Bruce Brainard’s bedroom at two
o’clock on Tuesday morning, and you carried a razor.”
“You lie!” Noyes’ voice rang out bravely, but his agonized expression
contradicted his words. “Craig Porter is a hopeless paralytic. He can
neither leave his bed nor speak.”
Dorothy did not shrink before his furious glare.
“True, Craig cannot speak and he cannot get out of bed,” she admitted.
“But he has regained the use of his first finger, and with that he
signaled to me, using the Continental wireless code, that from his
position in bed he can see what transpires in the next bedroom.”
“How?” demanded Mitchell.
“You remember that there is a huge old-fashioned mirror facing Craig; a
similar mirror hangs directly opposite in the next bedroom and through
the open transom over Craig’s bed whatever transpires in the next
bedroom is reflected by one mirror from the angle at which it is hung
into the other.”
“Well, by--!” Mitchell stared dazedly at Dorothy. “And the bed Craig
Porter occupies and the one Brainard occupied are backed against the
wall which separates the two bedrooms, and both the mirrors face the
beds.”
Mrs. Porter, her face ashy, looked appealingly at Dorothy. “What did
Craig see on Tuesday morning?” she mumbled rather than asked.
Vera, waiting breathlessly, was dimly conscious of Wyndham’s heavy
breathing.
“Craig caught a glimpse of Millicent approaching the bed, a razor
clasped tightly in her raised hand, then she disappeared out of
his line of vision.” Dorothy’s hands were opening and closing
spasmodically; she dared not glance at Wyndham for fear of breaking
down. Alan Noyes’ agony was pitiful to witness as he sat forward
striving to shield Millicent who crouched by his side, his one arm
about her. Dorothy’s statement held her spellbound.
“Craig said a little time elapsed,” went on Dorothy, and her voice
sounded strained and harsh in the tense stillness. “Then the night
light in Brainard’s bedroom was augmented by a powerful flashlight
standing on the bed-table, and Craig saw the bed and Bruce lying in it
with distinctness; he also saw a figure crouching by the bed, one hand
groping for the razor which lay near Brainard. The next instant there
was a sharp struggle and the murderer, straightening up, turned as if
to listen, and faced the mirror-- Don’t try to escape, Murray.”
The footman, edging toward the door, before which stood the Secret
Service operative, swallowed hard and sat down.
“The game’s up,” he acknowledged insolently. “Well, which is going to
claim the honor of arresting ‘Gentleman Charlie’--the Secret Service or
Detective Headquarters? Don’t all speak at once, gentlemen,” and his
jeering laugh awoke the others from their stupor.