A DEAD MAN UNDER THE COTTONWOODS
Billie was never out of hearing of the telephone all day, and at two
o'clock the reply came.
PHILIP SINGLETON, Rancho Granados, Arizona.
Kindly wire in detail the source of your information. No message
went to Granados from this office. No publicity has been given to
the dead horse situation. Your inquiry very important to the
Department of Justice.
OGDEN, BURNS & CO.
"Very strange, very!" murmured Singleton. "No matter how hard I think,
or from what angle, I can't account for it. Billie, this is too
intricate for me. The best thing I can do is to go over to Nogales and
talk to an attorney."
"Go ahead and talk," agreed Billie, "but I'd answer that telegram
first. This is no township matter, Papa Phil, can't you see that?"
"Certainly, certainly, but simply because of that fact I feel I should
have local advice. I have a legal friend in Nogales. If I could get
him on the wire----"
An hour later when Billie returned from a ride, she realized Singleton
had gotten his friend on the wire, for she heard him talking.
"Yes, this is Granados. Is that you, James? Yes, I asked them to have
you call me. I need to consult with you concerning a rather serious
matter. Yes, so serious I may say it is mysterious, and appalling. It
concerns a shipment of horses. Conrad is in Sonora, and this subject
can't wait--no, I can't get in touch with Conrad. He is out of
communication when over there--No, I can't wait his return. I've had a
wire from Ogden and Burns, New York--said Ogden and Burns--All right,
get a pencil; I'll hold the wire."
There was a moment of silence, and if a telephonic camera had been
installed at Granados, Mr. Singleton might have caught a very
interesting picture at the other end of the wire.
A middle-aged man in rusty black of semi-clerical cut held the
receiver, and the effect of the names as given over the wire was, to
put it mildly, electrical. His jaw dropped and he stared across the
table at a man who was seated there. At the repetition of the name,
the other arose, and with the stealthily secretive movement of a
coyote near its prey he circled the table, and drew a chair close to
the telephone. The pencil and paper was in his hand, not in that of
"James." That other was Conrad.
Then the telephone conversation was resumed after Mr. Singleton had
been requested to speak a little louder--there seemed some flaw in the
connection.
In the end Singleton appeared much comforted to get the subject off
his own shoulders by discussing it with another. But he had been
convinced that the right thing to do was to motor over to the Junction
and take the telegrams with him for consultation. He would start
about eight in the morning, and would reach the railroad by noon. Yes,
by taking the light car which he drove himself it would be an easy
matter.
Billie heard part of this discourse in an absent-minded way, for she
was not at all interested as to what some strange lawyer in Nogales
might think of the curious telegrams.
She would have dropped some of that indifference if she had been able
to hear the lurid language of Conrad after the receiver was hung up.
James listened to him in silence for a bit, and then said:
"It's your move, brother! There are not supposed to be any mistakes in
the game, and you have permitted our people to wire you a victory when
you were not there to get the wire, and that was a mistake."
"But Brehman always----"
"You sent Brehman East and for once forgot what might happen with your
office empty. No,--it is not Singleton's fault; he did the natural
thing. It is not the operator's fault; why should he not give a
message concerning horses to the proprietor of the horse ranch?"
"But Singleton never before made a move in anything of management,
letters never opened, telegrams filed but never answers sent until I
am there! And this time! It is that most cursed Rhodes, I know it is
that one! They told me he was high in fever and growing worse, and
luck with me! So you yourself know the necessity that I go over for
the Sonora conference--there was no other way. It is that Rhodes! Yes,
I know it, and they told me he was as good as dead--God! if again I
get him in these hands!"
He paced the floor nervously, and flung out his clenched hands in
fury, and the quiet man watched him.
"That is personal, and is for the future," he said, "but Singleton is
not a personal matter. If he lives he will be influenced to
investigation, and that must not be. It would remove you from
Granados, and you are too valuable at that place. You must hold that
point as you would hold a fort against the enemy. When Mexico joins
with Germany against the damned English and French, this fool mushroom
republic will protest, and that is the time our friends will sweep
over from Mexico and gather in all these border states--which were
once hers--and will again be hers through the strong mailed hand of
Germany! This is written and will be! When that day comes, we need
such points of vantage as Granados and La Partida; we must have them!
You have endangered that position, and the mistake won't be wiped out.
The next move is yours, Conrad."
The quiet man in the habiliments of shabby gentility in that bare
little room with the American flag over the door and portraits of two
or three notable advocates of World Peace and the American League of
Neutrality on the wall, had all the outward suggestion of the small
town disciple of Socialism from the orthodox viewpoint. His manner was
carefully restrained, and his low voice was very even, but at his last
words Conrad who had dropped into a seat, his head in his hands,
suddenly looked up, questioning.
"Singleton can probably do no more harm today," went on the quiet
voice. "I warned him it would be a mistake to discuss it until after
he had seen me. He starts at eight in the morning, alone, for the
railroad but probably will not reach there." He looked at his watch
thoughtfully. "The Tucson train leaves in fifty minutes. You can get
that. Stop off at the station where Brehman's sister is waitress. She
will have his car ready, that will avoid the Junction. It will be
rough work, Conrad, but it is your move. It is an order."
And then before that carefully quiet man who had the appearance of a
modest country person, Adolf Conrad suddenly came to his feet in
military salute.
"Come, we will talk it over," suggested his superior. "It will be
rough, yet necessary, and if it could appear suicide, eh? Well, we
will see. We--will--see!"
* * * * *
At seven in the morning the Granados telephone bell brought Singleton
into the patio in his dressing gown and slippers. And Dona Luz who was
seeing that his breakfast was served, heard him express surprise and
then say:
"Why, certainly. If you are coming this way as far on the road as the
Jefferson ranch of course we can meet there, and I only need to go
half way. That will be excellent. Yes, and if Judge Jefferson is at
home he may be able to help with his advice. Fine! Good-bye."
When Dona Luz was questioned about it later she was quite sure Mr.
Singleton mentioned no name, his words were as words to a friend.
But all that day the telephone was out of order on the Granados line,
and Singleton did not return that night. There was nothing to cause
question in that, as he had probably gone on to Nogales, but when the
second day came and the telephone not working, Billie started Pedro
Vijil to ride the line to Granados Junction, get the mail, and have a
line man sent out for repairs wherever they were needed.
It was puzzling because there had been no storm, nothing of which they
knew to account for the silent wire. The line was an independent one
from the Junction, and there were only two stations on it, the
Jefferson ranch and Granados.
But Vijil forgot about the wire, for he met some sheep men from the
hills carrying the body of Singleton. They had found him in the
cottonwoods below the road not five miles from the hacienda. His car
he had driven off the road back of a clump of thick mesquite. The
revolver was still in his hand, and the right temple covered with
black blood and flies.
There was nothing better to do than what the herders were doing. The
man had been dead a day and must be buried, also it was necessary to
send a man to Jefferson's, where there was a telephone, to get in
touch with someone in authority and arrange for the funeral.
So the herders walked along with their burden carried in a _serape_,
and covered by the carriage robe. Pedro had warned them to halt at his
own house, for telephone calls would certainly gather men, who would
help to arrange all decently before the body was taken into the _sala_
of Granados.
There is not much room for conjecture as to the means of a man's
taking off when he is found with a bullet in his right temple, a
revolver in his right hand, and only one empty cartridge shell in the
revolver. There seemed no mystery about the death, except the cause of
suicide.
It was the same evening that Conrad riding in from the south,
attempted to speak over the wire with Granados and got from Central
information that the Granados wire was broken, and Singleton, the
proprietor, a suicide.
The coroner's inquest so pronounced it, after careful investigation of
the few visible facts. Conrad was of no value as a witness because he
had been absent in Magdalena. He could surmise no reason for such an
act, but confessed he knew practically nothing of Singleton's personal
affairs. He was guardian of his stepdaughter and her estate, and so
far as Conrad knew all his relations with the personnel of the estate
were most amicable. Conrad acknowledged when questioned that Singleton
did usually carry a revolver when out in the car, he had a horror of
snakes, and he had never known him to use a gun for anything else.
Dona Luz Moreno confused matters considerably by her statement that
Mr. Singleton was going to meet some man at the Jefferson ranch
because the man had called him up before breakfast to arrange it.
Later it was learned that no call was made from any station over the
wire that morning to Granados. There was in fact several records of
failure to get Granados. No one but Dona Luz had heard the call and
heard Singleton reply, yet it was not possible that this communication
could be a fact over a broken wire, and the wire was found broken
between the Jefferson ranch and Granados.
Whereupon word promptly went abroad among the Mexicans that Senor
Singleton had been lured to his death by a spirit voice calling over a
broken wire as a friend to a friend. For the rest of her life Dona
Luz will have that tale to tell as the evidence of her own ears that
warnings of death do come from the fearsome spirits of the shadowed
unknown land,--and this in denial of all the padres' godly discourse
to the contrary!
A Mr. Frederick James of Nogales, connected with a group of charitable
gentlemen working for the alleviating of distress among the many
border exiles from Mexico, was the only person who came forward
voluntarily to offer help to the coroner regarding the object of the
dead man's journey to Nogales. Mr. James had been called on the
telephone by Mr. Singleton, who was apparently in great distress of
mind concerning mysterious illness and deaths of horses shipped from
Granados to France. A telegram had come from New York warning him that
the Department of Justice was investigating the matter, and the
excitement and nervousness of Mr. Singleton was such that Mr. James
readily consented to a meeting in Nogales, with the hope that he might
be of service in any investigation they would decide upon after
consultation. When Mr. Singleton did not keep the engagement, Mr.
James attempted to make inquiries by telephone. He tried again the
following morning, but it was only after hearing of the suicide--he
begged pardon--the death of Mr. Singleton, that he recalled the fact
that all of Singleton's discourse over the telephone had been unusual,
excitable to a degree, while all acquaintances of the dead man knew
him as a quiet, reserved man, really unusually reserved, almost to the
point of the secretive. Mr. James was struck by the unusual note of
panic in his tones, but as a carload of horses was of considerable
financial value, he ascribed the excitement in part to that, feeling
confident of course that Mr. Singleton was in no ways accountable for
the loss, but----
Mr. James was asked if the nervousness indicated by Mr. Singleton was
a fear of personal consequences following the telegram, but Mr. James
preferred not to say. He had regarded Mr. Singleton as a model of most
of the virtues, and while Singleton's voice and manner had certainly
been unusual, he could not presume to suspect the inner meaning of
it.
The telegraph and telephone records bore out the testimony of Mr.
James.
The fact that the first telegram was addressed to the manager, Mr.
Conrad, had apparently nothing to do with the case, since the
telegraph files showed that messages were about evenly divided in the
matter of address concerning ranch matters. They were often addressed
simply to "Granados Rancho" or "Manager Granados Ranch." This one
simply happened to be addressed to the name of the manager.
The coroner decided that the mode of address had no direct bearing on
the fact that the man was found dead under the cottonwoods with copies
of both telegrams in his pocket, both written in a different hand from
his carefully clear script as shown in his address book. Safe in his
pocket also was money, a gold watch with a small gold compass, and a
handsome seal ring. Nothing was missing, which of course precluded the
thought of murder for robbery, and Philip Singleton was too mildly
negative to make personal enemies, a constitutional neutral.
Billie, looking very small and very quiet, was brought in by Dona Luz
and Mr. Jefferson of the neighboring ranch, fifty miles to the east.
She had not been weeping. She was too stunned for tears, and there was
a strangely ungirlish tension about her, an alert questioning in her
eyes as she looked from face to face, and then returned to the face of
the one man who was a stranger, the kindly sympathetic face of Mr.
Frederick James.
She told of the telegrams she had copied, and of the distress of
Singleton, but that his distress was no more than her own, that she
had been crying about the horses, and he had tried to comfort her. She
did not believe he had a trouble in the world of his own, and he had
never killed himself--never!
When asked if she had any reason to suspect a murderer, she said if
they ever found who killed the horses they would find who killed her
Papa Phil, but this opinion was evidently not shared by any of the
others. The report of horses dead on a transport in the Atlantic
ocean, and a man dead under the cottonwoods in Arizona, did not appear
to have any definite physical relation to each other, unless of course
the loss of the horses had proven too much of a shock to Mr. Singleton
and upset his nerves to the extent that moody depression had developed
into temporary dementia. His own gun had been the evident agent of
death.
One of the Mexicans recalled that Singleton had discharged an American
foreman in anger, and that the man had been in a rage about it, and
assaulted Mr. Conrad, whereupon Conrad was recalled, and acknowledged
the assault with evident intent to kill. Yes, he heard the man Rhodes
had threatened Singleton with a nastier accident than his attempt on
Conrad. No, he had not heard it personally, as he was unconscious
when the threat was made.
"It wasn't a threat!" interrupted Billie, "it was something different,
a warning."
"A warning of what?"
Billie was about to quote Kit's opinion concerning Singleton's ranch
force, when she was halted by a strange thing--for Billie; it was
merely the mild steady gaze of the quiet gentleman of the peaceful
league of the neutrals. There was a slight lifting of his brows as she
spoke of a warning; and then a slight suggestion of a smile--it might
have been a perfectly natural incredulous smile, but Billie felt that
it was not. The yellowish brown eyes narrowed until only the pupils
were visible, and warm though the day was, Billie felt a swift chill
over her, and her words were cautious.
"I can't say, I don't know, but Kit Rhodes had no grudge against Papa
Phil. He seemed in some way to be sorry for him."
She noted that Conrad's gaze was on the face of Mr. James instead of
on her.
"Sorry for him?"
"Y-yes, sort of. He tried to explain why, but Papa would not listen,
and would not make any engagement with him. Sent his money by Captain
Pike and wouldn't see him. But Kit Rhodes did not make a threat, he
did not!"
Her last denial was directly at Conrad, who merely shrugged his
shoulders as if to dispose of that awkward phase of the matter.
"It was told me so, but the Mexican men might not have understood the
words of Rhodes--he was in a rage--and it may be he did not mean so
much as he said."
"But he didn't say it!" insisted Billie.
"Very good, he did not, and it is a mistake of mine," agreed Conrad
politely. "For quite awhile I was unconscious after his assault,
naturally I know nothing of what was said."
"And where is this man Rhodes to be found?" asked the coroner, and
Conrad smiled meaningly.
"Nowhere,--or so I am told! He and a companion are said to have
crossed the line into Sonora twenty-four hours before the death of Mr.
Singleton."
"Well, unless there is some evidence that he was seen later on this
side, any threat he might or might not have made, has no relation
whatever to this case. Is there any evidence that he was seen at, or
near, Granados after starting for Sonora?"
No evidence was forthcoming, and the coroner, in summoning up,
confessed he was not satisfied to leave certain details of the case a
mystery.
That Singleton had discharged Rhodes in anger, and Rhodes had, even by
intimation, voiced a threat against Singleton could not be considered
as having any bearing on the death of the latter; while the voice of
the unknown calling him to a meeting at Jefferson's ranch was equally
a matter of mystery, since no one at Jefferson's knew anything of the
message, or the speaker, and investigation developed the fact that the
telephone wire was broken between the two ranches, and there was no
word at Granados Junction Central of any message to Granados after
five o'clock the afternoon of the previous day.
And, since Philip Singleton never reached the Jefferson ranch, but
turned his car off the road at the cottonwood canon, and was found
with one bullet in his head, and the gun in his own hand, it was not
for a coroner's jury to conjecture the impulse leading up to the act,
or the business complications by which the act might, or might not,
have been hastened. But incomprehensible though it might seem to all
concerned there was only one finding on the evidence submitted, and
that was suicide.
"Papa Phil never killed himself, never!" declared Billie. "That would
be two suicides in a month for Granados, and two is one too many. We
never had suicides here before."
"Who was the other?"
"Why, Miguel Herrara who had been arrested for smuggling, was searched
and his gun taken, and yet that night found a gun to kill himself with
in the adobe where he was locked up! Miguel would not have cared for a
year or two in jail; he had lived there before, and hadn't tried any
killing. I tell you Granados is getting more than its share."
"It sure looks like it, little lady," agreed the coroner, "but
Herrara's death gives us no light or evidence on Singleton's death,
and our jurisdiction is limited strictly to the hand that held the
gun. The evidence shows it was in the hand of Mr. Singleton when
found."
The Jeffersons insisted that Billie go home with them, as the girl
appeared absolutely and pathetically alone in the world. She knew of
no relatives, and Tia Luz and Captain Pike were the only two whom she
had known from babyhood as friends of her father's.
The grandmother of Billie Bernard had been the daughter of a Spanish
_haciendado_ who was also an officer in the army of Mexico. He met
death in battle before he ever learned that his daughter, in the pious
work of nursing friend and enemy alike, had nursed one enemy of the
hated North until each was captive to the other, and she rode beside
him to her father's farthest northern rancho beyond the Mexican
deserts, and never went again to the gay circles of Mexico's capital.
Late in her life one daughter, Dorotea was born, and when Alfred
Bernard came out of the East and looked on her, a blonde Spanish girl
as her ancestresses of Valencia had been, the game of love was played
again in the old border rancho which was world enough for the lovers.
There had been one eastern summer for them the first year of their
marriage, and Philip Singleton had seen her there, and never forgot
her. After her widowhood he crossed the continent to be near her, and
after awhile his devotion, and her need of help in many ways, won the
place he coveted, and life at Granados went on serenely until her
death. Though he had at times been bored a bit by the changelessness
of ranch life, yet he had given his word to guard the child's
inheritance until she came of age, and had kept it loyally as he knew
how until death met him in the canon of the cottonwoods.
But the contented isolation of her immediate family left Billie only
such guardian as the court might appoint for her property and person,
and Andrew Jefferson, Judge Jefferson by courtesy, in the county,
would no doubt be choice of the court as well as the girl. Beyond that
she could only think of Pike, and--well Pike was out of reach on some
enchanted gold trail of which she must not speak, and she supposed she
would have to go to school instead of going in search of him!
Conrad spoke to her kindly as she was led to the Jefferson car, and
there was a subtle deference in his manner, indicating his realization
that he was speaking--not to the wilful little maid who could be
annoying--but to the owner of Granados and, despite his five year
contract as manager, an owner who could change entirely the activities
of the two ranches in another year--and it was an important year.
He also spoke briefly to Mr. James offering him the hospitality of the
ranch for a day of rest before returning to Nogales, but the offer was
politely declined. Mr. James intimated that he was at Conrad's service
if he could be of any practical use in the mysterious situation. He
carefully gave his address and telephone number, and bade the others
good day. But as he was entering his little roadster he spoke again to
Conrad.
"By the way, it was a mistake to let that man Rhodes get over into
Sonora. It should be the task of someone to see that he does not come
back. He seems a very dangerous man. See to it!"
The words were those of a kindly person interested in the welfare of
the community, and evidently impressed by the evidence referring to
the discharged range boss. Two of the men hearing him exchanged
glances, for they also thought that rumor of the threats should have
been looked into. But the last three words were spoken too softly for
any but Conrad to hear.
The following week Billie went to Tucson with the Jeffersons and at
her request Judge Jefferson was appointed guardian of her person and
estate, after which she and the judge went into a confidential session
concerning that broken wire on the Granados line.
"I'm not loco, Judge," she insisted, "but I want you to learn whether
that wire was cut on purpose, or just broke itself. Also I want you to
take up that horse affair with the secret service people. I don't want
Conrad to be sent away--yet. I'd rather watch him on Granados. I won't
go away to school; I'd rather have a teacher at home. We can find
one."
"But, do you realize that with two mysterious deaths on Granados
lately, you might run some personal risk of living there with only
yourself and two women in the house? I'm not sure we can sanction
that, my child."
Billie smiled at him a bit wanly, but decided.
"Now Judge, you know I picked you because you would let me do whatever
I pleased, and I don't mean to be disappointed with you. Half the men
at the inquest think that Kit Rhodes did come back to do that
shooting, and you know Conrad and the very smooth rat of the Charities
Society are accountable for that opinion. The Mexican who dragged in
Kit's name is one of Conrad's men; it all means something! It's a bad
muddle, but Kit Rhodes and Cap Pike will wander back here some of
these days, and I mean to have every bit of evidence for Kit to start
in with. He suspected a lot, and all Granados combined to silence
him--fool Granados!"
"But, just between ourselves, child, are you convinced Rhodes did not
make the statement liable to be construed into a threat against Mr.
Singleton?"
"Convinced nothing," was the inelegant reply of his new ward. "I heard
him say enough to hang him if evidence could be found that he was
north of the line that morning, and that's why it's my job to take
note of all the evidence on the other side. The horses did not kill
themselves. That telegram concerning it did not send itself. Papa Phil
did not shoot himself, and that telephone wire did not cut itself! My
hunch is that those four things go together, and that's a combination
they can't clear up by dragging in the name of a man who never saw the
horses, and who was miles south in Sonora with Cap Pike when the other
three things happened. Now can they?"