DEVELOPMENTS
SCURRYING footsteps caused Peter Burnham to stop unwrapping the bundle
in his hand and dart to the door of his bedroom. From that vantage
point he saw Evelyn cross the hall and disappear down the staircase.
He took quick note of her well cut sport suit and the lovely bouquet
of orchids pinned thereon. Evelyn, busily engaged in adjusting a
stray curl under her smart tri-cornered hat, failed to observe her
step-father standing well back in the shadow of his doorway. Burnham
waited in indecision until the slam of the front door reached him, then
going back to his bureau he closed its drawers and went swiftly to his
wife’s boudoir.
Mrs. Burnham looked up at his approach and dropped her knitting in her
lap.
“Don’t close the door, Peter,” she remonstrated. “It is very warm in
here and the room is stuffy.”
“Then why not open this second window?” asked Burnham. Not waiting
for an answer to his question, he threw up the sash and in the sudden
current of air admitted by the opening of the window, the papers on
his wife’s desk blew about the room.
“There, Peter, see what you have done.” Mrs. Burnham’s vexation was
betrayed by her heightened color. “And I have just tidied my desk. Be
sure and put every letter back exactly where it was.”
It took Burnham some minutes to comply with her request, and she
observed with silent, but growing irritation, that her correspondence
was not being piled in neat little packages such as she had arranged
with minute attention to detail earlier that morning.
“Don’t trouble to put the bills uppermost,” she said, her eyes
twinkling. “That will do nicely, Peter; come and sit down, you look
warm,” and her pointed knitting needle indicated the vacant arm chair,
the mate to the one she was occupying, which, with her chair and a
table, about filled the octagon-shaped wing of her boudoir.
Burnham sat down with a short, discontented sigh. “I can’t conceive why
we closed the Lodge and came in town so early,” he grumbled, dabbing
his forehead with a handkerchief. “Washington is unbearable.”
“The nights are not so bad, and if you would keep cool, Peter, you
would not feel the heat so much.” Mrs. Burnham took up her knitting.
“If I remember correctly it was you who first suggested our returning
this month.”
Burnham moved restlessly and pursed up his lips. “Well, what could we
do with Evelyn taking the bit in her teeth?” he demanded. “You cannot
detain a girl in a convent by force, and she could not remain in this
city unchaperoned.”
“True.” Mrs. Burnham contented herself with the single word and knitted
on in silence.
“It is a great pity, Lillian,” complained Burnham, growing restive
under the short quick glances with which his wife favored him, “that
your discipline was so lax; in consequence, Evelyn has grown up with
the idea that her wish is law.”
“She comes of a headstrong race,” acknowledged Mrs. Burnham, with a
half sigh. “Do not worry, Peter, Evelyn will consider herself madly in
love a dozen times before she actually finds the man she will marry.”
Burnham leaned back in his chair and thrust his hands in his pockets.
“René La Montagne is still in town,” he announced.
“Not really?” Mrs. Burnham laid aside her knitting. “I understood he
had been detailed to one of the aviation training camps in the South.”
“He hasn’t gone yet for Maynard told me that he saw him at the Shoreham
Tuesday night.” Mrs. Burnham made no comment and her husband added
with suppressed vehemence, “Tough luck!”
Mrs. Burnham drummed her knitting needles up and down on the arm of her
chair in troubled silence.
“I disapprove of international marriages,” she said finally. “I have
seen too many unhappy results; take, for instance, Marian Van Ness----”
Her needles clicked loudly in the still room, and there was a decided
pause before she added: “I don’t really know the rights of the case as
Marian was married in Europe and passed her brief matrimonial career
away from Washington, but,” again Mrs. Burnham paused, “but I agree
with the diplomat who said: ‘Those whom the Atlantic has put asunder,
let no man join together.’”
“You will have a difficult task convincing Evelyn of your viewpoint,”
retorted Burnham. “If I don’t mistake the signs you may face an
elopement, if, as I strongly suspect, Evelyn and René are carrying on a
clandestine correspondence.”
Mrs. Burnham stooped to retrieve her ball of yarn which had rolled to
the floor before she asked: “Where did you get that idea?”
“From Jones, whose mysterious manner when I met him carrying a box
of flowers to Evelyn and delivering a note surreptitiously made me
suspicious. I promptly told him to report to you hereafter whenever
letters and packages were given him for Evelyn.”
“Quite right.” Mrs. Burnham spoke with decision. “We want no
elopements; but upon my word, Peter, I could not help but like René La
Montagne. If it were not for the fact that he is a foreigner and that
he is personally objectionable to you----” She hesitated and cast a
penetrating look at her husband who sat staring moodily at the floor.
“He is still objectionable to you?” she asked.
“Yes, but why go into that?” he answered sharply, then yawned. “Upon
my word, Lillian, I have had very little sleep lately; I believe I’ll
go and take a nap.” As he spoke he rose and stretched himself, then
took several indolent steps toward the door, but his wife’s next remark
halted him on its threshold.
“Any news from Coroner Penfield?”
“Not a word.” Burnham rubbed his chin reflectively. “The police,
according to the morning newspapers, have failed to discover the man’s
identity.”
“Strange!” mused Mrs. Burnham. “And haven’t they ascertained why he was
killed in this house?”
Burnham shifted his weight first on one foot and then on the other, his
hands clenched inside his coat pockets.
“My dear Lillian, you cannot establish a motive for the crime--if
crime it was,” he interpolated, “until you establish the man’s
identity. See you later,” and smiling affectionately at her he turned
and left the room.
Mrs. Burnham knitted on and the khaki sweater gained in size as her
industrious fingers plied the needles. Finally she laid the half
completed garment in her lap and looked about the boudoir. It was a
pleasant room, light and airy, and its home-like atmosphere was borne
out in its furniture still covered with summer chintz. The oddly shaped
octagon wing added to its size and general appearance.
Mrs. Burnham stared thoughtfully down into the garden which the octagon
windows overlooked, then turned her head and glanced through the side
window diagonally across into Evelyn’s bedroom. From where she sat
she viewed with displeasure the clothes thrown in a disorderly heap
on Evelyn’s bed and started to call through the opened windows to the
chambermaid whom she glimpsed in another part of the room, not to put
away the clothes but to leave that task to Evelyn. Even as she made up
her mind, the maid whisked out of the bedroom and Mrs. Burnham turned
her attention to the room in which she was sitting.
Laying her knitting on the table she listened a moment. Only the
twitter of birds and the distant hum of a motor disturbed the peaceful
autumn stillness. Releasing her hold on the sweater, Mrs. Burnham
picked up her large knitting bag and when she removed her hand from
its capacious interior her fingers grasped a pair of shell spectacles
and a book. Laying the latter in her lap she adjusted the spectacles
on her nose, then she raised the book and scanned its title: “Taylor’s
Medical Jurisprudence and Toxicology.” She turned the leaves rapidly
until she came to the heading “Detection of Poisons” and her eyes ran
down the pages picking out the paragraphs opposite which she discerned
faint pencil marks. When she again returned the book to its place in
her knitting bag an hour had passed.
Blissfully unconscious that she had formed the chief topic of
conversation between her step-father and mother, Evelyn Preston, on
leaving the house, hurried to Dupont Circle and seeing a disengaged
taxi waiting at the cab-stand she entered the machine and directed the
chauffeur to take her to Potomac Park.
As the taxi-cab threaded its way among the vehicles filling Seventeenth
Street below Pennsylvania Avenue, Evelyn gazed in wonder at the
congested sidewalks. It was the noon hour and clerks from the immense
Government buildings in the vicinity were hurrying to lunch rooms and
cafeterias which had sprung up like mushrooms to meet the demands of
hungry humanity. Evelyn mentally contrasted the scene with that in the
same locality six months before and shook her head in bewilderment; the
once peaceful old-time residence district had been electrified into
life by the iron hand of war.
The taxi-cab, narrowly missing an on-coming touring car which
zig-zagged unpleasantly in its effort to make the turn into Seventeenth
Street, swung into Potomac Drive and, following Evelyn’s directions,
the chauffeur drove his car to the Aviation Field which had been
formerly the polo grounds of the National Capital. The taxi-cab’s
approach had been observed from the hangar, and one of the officers
standing near the building crossed the turf and was at the roadside
when the car drew up.
As Evelyn looked down into La Montagne’s happy upturned face all the
doubts which had been tormenting her vanished. Without speaking he
jerked open the cab door and seated himself by her side.
“My heart’s dearest,” he murmured in rapid French. “At last!” and his
hands clasped hers and stooping he kissed her in the shelter of the
closed cab. “Mrs. Van Ness explained----” he began a moment later.
“Indeed she did, bless her!” ejaculated Evelyn happily, in his native
tongue which she spoke with barely an accent, and she touched her
orchids with tender fingers. “These flowers came through her agency, as
well as your dear note, René.”
“I followed her advice.” La Montagne’s face darkened. “But I like
not to court you in secret, dear heart; surely your mother is one to
see reason. I am not,” flushing, “objectionable; nor am I altogether
without money.”
“I do not think it was mother who suppressed your letters,” exclaimed
Evelyn. “I suspect my step-father----”
An exclamation interrupted her. “I cannot understand a nature so
complex,” declared La Montagne. “Mr. Burnham on the surface, perhaps,
is the most gracious host----” He paused abruptly. “But do not let
us waste the precious hour talking of him; what of yourself?” and he
scanned her with adoring eyes.
“I am very well and--” with a shy upward look--“happy, now that your
silence is explained.” Her eyes filled with tears. “Ah, René, I was
cruelly hurt by your apparent neglect.”
“Never think that of me again,” exclaimed La Montagne, deep feeling in
voice and gesture. “You are my ideal, my love. I will marry you with or
without your mother’s consent.”
Evelyn shook her head in dissent as she pressed his hand. “We will
marry, but it will be with mother’s approval,” she said. “Mr. Burnham
is clever, but he cannot hoodwink mother all the time; and”--she nodded
wisely--“I have a score to settle for what he made me suffer this
summer.”
“Were you ill-treated, heart’s dearest?” demanded La Montagne.
“Oh, no. I chose the convent after a dispute with Mr. Burnham who
insisted that I accept Mary Palmer’s invitation to spend the summer
with her in the Adirondacks.” She hesitated, then in a sudden burst
of confidence, added a trifle incoherently: “I didn’t care to accept
because, you see, Mary’s brother, Jim Palmer, has--well, he--that is,
he likes me.”
“I can well believe it,” acknowledged La Montagne and they laughed
light-heartedly, but a shadow lurked in his handsome eyes as he glanced
at her fresh young beauty. “And this Monsieur Jim, does he make love?”
“Well, he tries to,” admitted Evelyn, and a faint roguish dimple
appeared in her cheek as a sudden recollection of a scene with Jim
Palmer at the Chevy Chase Club brought a covert smile to her lips. “Mr.
Palmer is my step-father’s most intimate friend, and so----”
“He favors the match; ah, I begin to see.” La Montagne straightened
his slender figure to military erectness. “There is a motive then for
Mr. Burnham’s animosity other than that suggested by our good friend,
Madame Van Ness. But tell me, Evelyn,” and his tender voice caressed
her name, “what is this I read in the newspapers of a dead man in your
house?”
“I know no more about it than what you saw in the papers.” Evelyn’s
blue eyes clouded. “It was a great shock to find him sitting there in
the library--dead. Apparently the police are at as great a loss about
the whole affair as I am.”
“I saw they had not decided the man’s identity.” The Frenchman paused
and glanced doubtfully at Evelyn; he had been quick to observe her loss
of color at mention of the tragedy and concluded with the intuitive
sympathy of his nature that the subject distressed her, and the words
which he had intended to say remained unspoken. “Let us discuss no more
such gloomy matters. Will you not lunch with me at the Willard?”
Evelyn considered the invitation before she answered. “I wish I could
accept,” she said, and her disappointment was evident. “But there is
no use needlessly antagonizing mother. She is a great stickler for
the conventions, and I know she would not permit me to lunch with you
unchaperoned.”
[Illustration: He took out Marian’s package of papers and placed them
in Evelyn’s lap.]
“But where can we meet?” demanded La Montagne; a glance at the hangar
had shown him an orderly advancing toward the car and he rightly
divined that his presence was required by a brother officer. “Heart’s
dearest, do not let it be long before I see you again.”
“I am dining to-night with Marian, why not come to her apartment this
evening?”
“Excellent!” La Montagne nodded to the orderly who stood at salute
beside the car. “I will be with the colonel at once,” he said
addressing him and as the soldier moved away, he turned again to Evelyn
and kissed her hand passionately before he sprang from the car. “Ah, I
just remember--you will see Mrs. Van Ness before I do, therefore will
you hand her these papers which I was so forgetful as to carry away in
my pocket when I left her yesterday?” As he spoke he took out Marian’s
package of papers and placed them in Evelyn’s lap.
Evelyn’s chauffeur, finding that she and La Montagne were too absorbed
in each other to pay attention to him, had wandered over to the hangar,
keeping a watchful eye on his car. He had overheard the dispatch of
the orderly for La Montagne, and had promptly hurried back to the car,
reaching it just as the Frenchman strode away.
“Where to, Miss?” he asked. Evelyn, absorbed in watching La Montagne,
actually jumped as his harsh voice recalled her attention. She gazed at
him blankly for a moment.
“To Woodward and Lothrop’s,” she directed, and added as he prepared to
slip into the driver’s seat, “Haven’t I seen you before?”
“Yes, Miss.” He half turned, his freckles and red hair showing
distinctly in the glare of the sunlight. “I took you home from the
Union Station on Tuesday morning.”
“Oh, surely, I remember now,” and Evelyn settled back in the car.
She was some time in doing her numerous errands and it was two hours
before the taxi-cab swung into her street and stopped with such
abruptness in front of her door that her many packages which partly
filled the seat by her side were deposited on the floor of the car.
With the aid of the apologetic chauffeur she was engaged in picking
them up when a voice behind her caused her to turn around.
“Let me help,” exclaimed Dan Maynard, and reaching past her he
retrieved a skein of worsted which eluded her grasp. “Your mother was
quite worried when you didn’t return for luncheon. In fact,” and his
charming smile was contagious, “I believe I stopped her from sending
the town crier after you.”
“And who is he?” asked Evelyn laughing.
“Burnham, perhaps.” Maynard laughed also. “Let me pay the man, your
hands are full,” as she fumbled for her purse.
“No, no,” she protested, but Maynard, paying no attention, turned back
to question the chauffeur and before Evelyn could reach them Maynard
handed the man a bank note.
“We can settle it later, Evelyn,” he said. “Now, don’t let us squabble
over a trifle.”
“A trifle!” Evelyn laughed gayly. “I don’t call a three hour taxi bill
a trifle; however, we’ll let Mother arbitrate the dispute. What is it?”
as the chauffeur ran up to her.
“Another package, Miss,” and touching his hat he placed the bundle of
papers on top of the packages she carried and retired.
“Take care, you will drop them,” cautioned Maynard, putting a steadying
hand on the packages. He had just succeeded in readjusting their
balance when his sleeve button caught in a string, and as he drew back
his hand several papers from the package entrusted to her care by La
Montagne fluttered to the ground.
“Very awkward of me,” exclaimed Maynard, annoyed by his carelessness,
and he stooped to pick up the papers and returned them to Evelyn.
Then his hand sought the door bell and Evelyn, her eyes following his
motion, saw the string still dangling from his sleeve button. The
string, of woven red and green strands, stood out in bold relief
against the white woodwork of the doorway.
Where had she seen such a string before? Slowly Evelyn’s thoughts
returned to the scene in the library on Tuesday afternoon, and again
she saw a similar string removed from the dead man’s pocket and twirled
about in the coroner’s fingers.
Maynard’s glance had followed hers; his finger pressed the button of
the door bell hard, then was removed as he held up his hand.
“From which bundle did I pull off this string?” he asked.
Evelyn looked at the packages in her hand in uncertainty; Marian’s
bundle of papers was untied, a box of candy, and some stationery were
also minus their strings due to the careless handling they had received
while she carried them about with her on her shopping tour.
“I really don’t know,” she replied. “Oh, Jones,” as that worthy opened
the front door. “Do get me something to eat, I am famished.”
She turned back inside the hall to address Maynard, but he had stopped
just outside the door and was carefully pocketing the red and green
string.