Clews
I didn't reach my office until afternoon, and there I found Norah, in a
brown study.
She looked up with a smile as I came in.
"I'm neglecting my work," she said, with a glance at a pile of papers,
"but that affair across the hall has taken hold of me and I can't put it
out of my mind."
"Nor can I. I feel as if I were deeply involved in it,--if not indeed, an
accessory! But there are new developments. Mr. Manning is missing."
"Mr. Manning? What has he got to do with it?"
"With the crime? Nothing. He didn't come up here until Miss Raynor came,
you know. But----"
"Are they engaged?"
"Not that I know of. I think not."
"Well, they will be, then. And don't worry about Mr. Manning's absence.
He'll not stay long away from Miss Raynor. Who is he, anyway? I mean what
does he do?"
"He's a civil engineer and he lives in Gramercy Park. That's the extent
of my knowledge of him. I've seen him down in the bank once or twice
since I've been here, and I like his looks. I hope, for Miss Raynor's
sake, he'll turn up soon. She expected him to call on her last evening
and he didn't go there at all."
"I shouldn't think he would! Why, it was a fearful night. I was going to
the movies, but I couldn't think of going out in that wild gale! But
never mind Mr. Manning now, let's talk about the Gately affair. I want to
go over there and look around the office. Do you suppose they'd let me?"
"Why, I expect so. Is anybody there now?"
"Yes, a police detective,--that man, Hudson. You know they call him Foxy
Jim Hudson, and I suppose he's finding out a lot of stuff that isn't so!"
"You haven't a very high opinion of our arms of the law."
"Oh, they're all right,--but most detectives can't see what's right under
their noses!"
"Not omniscient Sherlocks, are they? And you think you could do a lot of
smarty-cat deduction?"
Norah didn't resent my teasing, but her gray eyes were very earnest as
she said, "I wish I could try. A woman was in that room yesterday
afternoon; someone besides Miss Raynor and the old lady Driggs."
"How do you know?"
"Take me over there and I'll show you. They'll let me in, with you to
back me."
We went across and the officer made no objections to our entrance. In
fact, he seemed rather glad of someone to talk to.
"We're sorta up against it," he confessed. "Our suspicions are all
running in one direction, and we don't like it."
"You have a suspect, then?" I asked.
"Hardly that, but we begin to think we know which way to look."
"Any clews around, to verify your suspicions?"
"Lots of 'em. But take a squint yourself, Mr. Brice. You're
shrewd-witted, and--my old eyes ain't what they used to was."
I took this mock humility for what it was worth,--nothing at all,--and I
humored the foxy one by a properly flattering disclaimer.
But I availed myself of his permission and tacitly assuming that it
included Norah, we began a new scrutiny of the odds and ends on Mr.
Gately's desk, as well as other details about the rooms.
Norah opened the drawer that Mr. Talcott had locked,--the key was now in
it.
"Where's the checkbook?" she asked, casually.
Hudson looked grave. "Mr. Pond's got that," he said; "Mr. Pond's Mr.
Gately's lawyer, and he took all his accounts and such. But that
check-book's a clew. You see the last stub in it shows a check drawn to a
woman----"
"I said it was a woman!" exclaimed Norah.
"Well, maybe,--maybe. Anyhow the check was drawn _after_ the ones made
out to Smith and the Driggs woman. So, the payee of that last check was
in here later than the other two."
"Who was she?" was Norah's not unnatural inquiry.
But Hudson merely looked at her, with a slight smile that she should
expect an answer to that question.
"Oh, all right," she retorted; "I see her hatpin is still here."
"If that there hatpin is a clew, you're welcome to it. We don't think it
is. Mr. Gately had frequent lady callers, as any man's got a right to
have, but because they leaves their hatpins here, that don't make 'em
murderers. No, I argue that if a woman shot Mr. Gately she would be cute
enough _not_ to leave her hatpin by way of a visitin' card."
This raised Hudson's mentality in my opinion, and I could see it also
scored with Norah.
"That's true," she generously agreed. "In books, as soon as I come to the
dropped handkerchief or broken cuff-link, I know that _isn't_ the
property of the criminal. But, all the same, people do leave clews,--why,
Sherlock Holmes says a person can't enter and leave a room without his
presence there being discoverable."
"Poppycock," said Hudson, briefly, and resumed his cogitation.
He was sitting at ease in Mr. Gately's desk-chair, but I could see the
man was thinking deeply, and as he had material for thought that he
wasn't willing to share with us, I returned to my own searching.
"Here's something the lady left!" I exclaimed, as on a silver ash-tray I
saw a cigarette stub, whose partly burned gold monogram betokened it had
served a woman's use.
"Hey, let that alone!" warned Hudson. "And don't be too previous;
sometimes men have gilt-lettered cigs, don't they?"
Without reply, I scrutinized the monogram. But only a bit remained
unburnt, and I couldn't make out the letters.
Norah was digging in the waste basket, and, the scamp! when Hudson's head
was turned, she surreptitiously fished out something which she hid in her
hand, and later transferred to her pocket.
"Nothing doing!" scoffed Hudson, as he turned and saw her occupation, "we
been all through that, and anything incriminating has been weeded out.
They wasn't much,--some envelopes and letters, but nothing of any
account. Oh, well, straws show which way the wind blows, and we've got
some several straws!"
"Is this one?" and Norah pointed to the carriage check, which still lay
on the desk.
[Illustration: Carriage Check/The Electric Carriage Call Co.]
"Nope. Me and the Chief, we decided that didn't mean nothing at all. It's
old, you can see, from its grimy look, so it wasn't left here yesterday.
Those things are always clean and fresh when they're given out, and
that's sorta soiled with age, you see."
"Well!" I exclaimed, "_why_ would a carriage check be soiled with age?
They're used the same day they're given out. Why is it here, anyway?"
Hudson looked interested. "That's so, Mr. Brice," he admitted. "I take it
that there check was given to Mr. Gately at some hotel, say. Well, he
didn't use it for some reason or other, and brought it home in his
pocket. But as you say, why is it here? _Why_ did he keep it? And, what
did he do with it to give it that thumbed, used look?"
We all examined the check. A bit of white cardboard, about two by four
inches in size, and pierced with seven circular holes in irregular order.
Across the top was printed "Don't fold this card," and at one end was the
number 743 in large red letters. Also, the right-hand upper corner was
sliced off.
"Why," I exclaimed, "here's a narrow strip of paper pasted across the
end, and--look,--it's almost transparent! I can read through it--'Hotel
St. Charles!' That's where it came from!"
"Hold your horses!" and Hudson smiled condescendingly, "that's where it
_didn't_ come from! It came from any hotel _except_ the St. Charles. You
may not know it, but often a hotel will use electric call-checks of other
hotels, with a slip of paper pasted over the name. That's an item for you
to remember. No, Mr. Brice, I can't attach any importance to that check,
but I'm free to confess I don't see why it's there. Unless Mr. Gately
found it in his pocket after it had been there unnoticed for some time.
And yet, it is very much thumbed, isn't it? That's queer. Maybe he used
it for a bookmark, or something like that."
"Maybe the lady left it here," suggested Norah. "The same time she left
her hatpin."
"Now, maybe she did," and Foxy Jim Hudson smiled benignly at her. "Any
ways, you've made the thing seem curious, and I guess I'll keep it for a
while."
He put the card away in his pocketbook, and Norah and I grinned at each
other in satisfaction that we had given him a clew to ponder over.
"You know, Mr. Brice," Hudson remarked, after another period of silent
thought, "you missed it, when you didn't fly in here quicker and catch
the murderer redhanded."
"If I'd known that the first door, Jenny's door, was the only one I could
open, of course I should have gone there first. But I'd never been in
here at all,--I've only been in the building a week or so, and I _did_
lose valuable time running from one door to another. But I still think
it's queer that I didn't see anything of the man Jenny describes."
"One reason is, there wasn't any such man," and Hudson seemed to enjoy my
blank look.
"What became of the murderer, then?"
"Went down in the car with Mr. Gately. Private elevator. Shot him on the
way down----"
"But man, I heard the shot,--and this room was full of smoke."
"Shot him twice, then. Say the first time, Mr. Gately wasn't killed and
could get into the elevator. Then murderer jumps in, too, and finishes
the job on the way down. It's a long trip to the ground floor, you know.
Then, murderer leaves elevator, slams door shut, and walks off."
I ruminated on this. It seemed absurd on the face of it, and yet----
"Why, then, did Jenny say she saw a man?" demanded Norah.
"Maybe she thought she did,--you know people think they see what they
think they ought to see. Jenny heard a shot, and running in, she
_expected_ to see a man with a pistol,--therefore, she thought she _did_
see him. Or, again, the girl is quite capable of making up a yarn out of
the solid. For the dramatic effect, you know, and to put her silly little
self in the limelight."
This was not unbelievable. Jenny was most unreliable as a witness. She
stumbled and contradicted herself as to the man's hat and had given
conflicting testimony about his overcoat.
"Well, as I say, Mr. Brice, the chance was yours to be on the spot but
you missed it. Of course, you are not to blame,--but it's a pity. Now,
s'pose you tell me again, as near as you can rec'lect, about that other
shadow,--the one that wasn't Mr. Gately."
I tried hard to add to my previously related details, but found it
impossible to do so.
"Well, could it have been a woman?"
"At first I should have said no, Mr. Hudson. But on thinking it over, I
suppose I may say it _could_ have been but I do not think it was."
"You know nowadays the women folks wear their hair plastered so close to
their heads that their heads wouldn't shadow up any bigger'n a man's."
"That's so," cried Norah. "A woman's head is smaller than a man's, but
her hair makes it appear larger in a shadow. Unless, as Mr. Hudson says,
she wore it wrapped round her head,--and didn't have much, anyway."
"You go outside, Mr. Brice," directed Hudson, "and look at the shadows of
me and Miss MacCormack, and then come back and tell us what you can
notice."
I did this, and the two heads were shadowed forth on the same door that I
had watched the day before. But the brighter daylight made the shadows
even more vague than yesterday, and I returned without much information.
"I could tell which was which, of course," I reported, "but it's true
that if I hadn't known you people at all, I could have mistaken Norah's
head for a man, and I might have believed, Hudson, that you were a woman.
It's surprising how little individuality was shown in the shadows."
"Well, of course they were clearer yesterday, as the hall was darker,"
mused Hudson. "After all, Mr. Brice, your testimony can't amount to much
unless we can get the actual murderer behind that glass, and some
peculiar shape or characteristic makes you recognize the head beyond all
doubt."
"I think I could do that," I returned; "for though I can't describe any
peculiarity, I'm sure I'd recognize the _same_ head."
"You are?" and Hudson looked at me keenly. "Well, perhaps we'll try you
out on that."
They had a definite suspect, then. And they proposed to experiment with
my memory. Well, I was ready, whenever they were.
Norah and I went into the third room, Hudson making no objection. At
another time we would have been deeply interested in the pictures and the
furnishings but now we had eyes and thoughts only for one thing.
We looked behind the war map and saw the elevator door, but could not
open it.
"The car's down," spoke up Hudson, who was watching us sharply. "I dunno
will it ever be used again. Though I suppose these rooms will be let to
somebody else, some time. Mr. Gately's things here will be sent to his
house, I expect, but his estate is a big one and will take a deal of
settling."
"Who's his executor?"
"Mr. Pond, his lawyer. But his financial affairs are all right. Nothing
crooked about Amos Gately--financially. You can bank on that!"
"How, then?" I asked, for the tone implied a mental reservation.
"I'm not saying. But they do say every man has a secret side to his life,
and why should Mr. Gately be a lone exception?"
"A woman?" asked Norah, always harking back to her basic suspicion.
Foxy Jim Hudson favored her with that blank stare which not infrequently
was his answer to an unwelcome question, and which, perhaps, had a share
in earning him his sobriquet.
Then he laughed, and said, "You've been reading detective stories, miss.
And you remember how they always say 'Churches lay femmy!' Well, go ahead
and church, if you like. But be prepared for a sad and sorrowful result."
The man was obviously deeply moved, and his big, homely face worked with
emotion.
But as he would tell us nothing further, and as Norah and I had finished
our rather unproductive search of the rooms, we went back to my office.
Here Norah showed me what she had taken from the waste basket.
"I'll give it back to him, if you say so," she offered; "but he could do
nothing with it, and maybe I can."
It was only a tiny scrap of pinkish paper, thin and greatly crumpled. I
took it.
"Be careful," warned Norah; "I don't suppose it could show finger prints,
but anyway, it's a sort of a kind of a clew."
"But what is it?" I asked, blankly, as I held the crumpled paper gingerly
in thumb and forefinger.
"It's a powder-paper," vouchsafed Norah, briefly.
"A what?"
"A powder-paper. Women carry them,--they come in little books. That's one
of the leaves. They're to rub on your face, and the powder comes off on
your nose or cheeks."
"Is that so? I never saw any before."
"Lots of girls use them." Norah's clear, wholesome complexion refuted any
idea of her needing such, and she spoke a bit scornfully.
"Proving once more the presence of what Friend Hudson calls a femmy," I
smiled.
"Yes; but these things have great individuality, Mr. Brice. This is of
exceedingly fine quality, it has a distinct, definite fragrance, and is
undoubtedly an imported article,--from France, likely."
"Can they get such things over now?"
"Oh, pshaw, it may have been imported before the war. This quality would
keep its odor forever! Anyway, don't you believe we could trace the woman
who used it and left it there? It must have happened yesterday, for the
basket is, of course, emptied every day in that office."
"Good girl, Norah!" and I nodded approval. "You are truly a She Sherlock!
A bit intimate, isn't it, for a woman to powder her nose in a man's
office?"
"Not at all, Mr. Old Fogey! Why, you can see the girls doing that
everywhere, nowadays. In the street-cars, in the theater,--anywhere."
"All right. How do you propose to proceed?"
"I think I'll go to the smartest Fifth Avenue perfume shops and try to
get a line on the maker of this paper."
My door opened then, and the Chief of Police stood in the doorway.
"Will you come over, across the hall, Mr. Brice?" he said.
"May I come?" piped up Norah, and without waiting for the answer, which,
by the way, never came, she followed us.
"We have learned a great deal," began the Chief, as I waited,
inquiringly. "And, now think carefully, Mr. Brice, I want you to tell me
if the head you saw shadowed on the door, could by any possibility have
been a woman's head?"
"I think it could have been, Chief; we've been talking that over, and I'm
prepared to say that it could have been,--but I don't think it was."
"And the shoulders? Though broad, like a man's, might not a woman's
figure, say, wrapped in furs, give a similar effect?"
An icy chill went through me, but I answered, "It might; the outlines
were very indistinct."
"We are carefully investigating the movements of Miss Raynor," he went
on, steadily, "and we find she told a deliberate untruth about where she
spent yesterday afternoon. She said she was at the house of a friend on
Park Avenue. We learned the name of the young lady and she says Miss
Raynor was not there at all yesterday. Also, we find that Miss Raynor was
in this office _after_ the calls of the old people we know about, and not
_before_ them, as Miss Raynor herself testified."
"But----" I began.
"Wait a moment, please. This is positively proved by the fact that a
check drawn to Miss Raynor by Mr. Gately follows immediately _after_ the
two checks drawn to Mr. Smith and Mrs. Driggs."
"Proving?" I gasped.
"That Miss Raynor is the last one known to be in this room before the
shooting occurred."
"Oh," cried Norah, "for shame! To suspect that lovely girl! Why, she
wouldn't harm a fly!"
"Do you know her?"
"No, sir; but----"
"It is an oft proven fact that the mildest, gentlest woman, if
sufficiently provoked to it, or if given a sudden opportunity, will in a
moment of passion do what no one would dream she could do! Miss Raynor
was very angry with her uncle,--Jenny admitted that, after much delay.
Mr. Gately had a revolver, usually in his desk drawer, but _not_ there
now. And,"--an impressive pause preceded the next argument, "Mr. Amory
Manning is not to be found."
"What do you deduce from that?" I asked, amazedly.
"That he has purposely disappeared, lest he be brought as a witness
against Miss Raynor. He could best help her cause, by being out of town
and impossible to locate. So, he went off, and she pretended she did not
know it. Of course, she did,--they connived at it----"
"Stop!" I cried, "you are romancing. You are assuming conditions that are
untrue!"
"I wish it were so," and the Chief exhibited a very human aspect for the
moment; "but I have no choice in the matter. I am driven by an inexorable
army of facts that cannot be beaten back. What else can you think of that
would account for Mr. Manning's sudden disappearance? Attacked? Nonsense!
Not in the storm of last evening. Abducted? Why? He is an inoffensive
citizen, not a millionaire or man of influence. You said you saw him last
night, Mr. Brice. Where, exactly, was that?"
I told of my trip down in the Third Avenue car, and of my getting off at
Twenty-second Street, meaning to speak to Mr. Manning. Then I told of his
sudden, almost mysterious disappearance.
"Not mysterious at all," said the Chief. "He gave you the slip purposely.
He went away at once, and has hidden himself carefully. But we will find
him. It's not easy for a man to hide from the police in this day and
generation!"
"But, Miss Raynor!" I said, still incredulous. "Why? What motive?"
"Because her uncle wouldn't let her marry Amory Manning. When she said
she went to her friend, Miss Clark's house, she really went to the home
of a Mrs. Russell, the sister of Manning. She was to meet Manning there.
I have all this straight from Mrs. Russell."
"And you think it was Miss Raynor's shadow I saw on the door!"
"You said it might have been a woman."
"Very well, then look for another woman! It was never Miss Raynor!"
"Your indignation, Mr. Brice, is both natural and admirable, but it is
based on your disinclination to think ill of Miss Raynor. The police are
not allowed the luxury of such sentiments."
"But--but--how did she--how did Miss Raynor get out of the room?"
"We do not entirely credit Jenny's story of the man with a revolver
running downstairs. And we do think that the person who did the shooting
may have gone down in the private elevator with the victim. It would be
easy to gain the street unnoticed, and it presupposes someone acquainted
with the working of the automatic elevator."
"But Miss Raynor said she had never seen it," I cried, triumphantly. "She
said she had only heard her uncle speak of it!"
"I know she _said_ so," returned the Chief.