BRIBERY
JAMES PALMER felt his clean shaven chin with nervous fingers and turned
away from contemplating himself in the mirror with a dissatisfied
scowl. Kicking aside his tumbled clothes, which lay half on, half off
the bed, he hurried into the living room of his apartment in time to
catch Dr. Hayden as the latter was leaving on his round of professional
visits.
“Give me a bracer, Hayden,” he demanded. “My nerves have gone to pot.”
Hayden scanned him closely and noted with professional interest his
bloodshot eyes and shifting, ever moving restless fingers.
“Go back to bed,” he directed. “You are not in shape to be about this
morning.”
“Shape or not, I’ve got to be in my office Sunday or no Sunday;
Government contracts don’t wait on nerves, time, or day. Those
cantonment plans must be shipped to----” Observing Hayden’s obdurate
manner, Palmer’s peremptory tone changed to one almost of pleading.
“Don’t send me to bed; I tell you I can’t sleep and I’ll go crazy if I
remain inactive. I _had_ to work last night; God knows if I can’t sleep
at night, I can’t sleep in daylight.”
Hayden considered him a moment, then drawing out his prescription pad
he wrote down directions, and tearing off the slip handed it to Palmer
who, impatient to be off, stood twirling his hat from one hand to
another.
“This mild bracer will give you relief, Palmer, but only temporarily.”
Hayden’s serious manner impressed Palmer in spite of his open
disinclination to follow his advice. “It is trite but true that no man
can burn the candle at both ends; working under pressure day and night
creates the necessity for sanitariums.”
Palmer frowned then smiled as he tucked the prescription safely away in
his vest pocket.
“The work will lighten up shortly,” he declared. “Come along; oh,
d----mn! there’s the ’phone.”
“Don’t wait, I’ll answer it,” and Hayden turned back into the apartment
as Palmer hurried down the corridor. Just as he reached the head of
the staircase a sound of voices drifted to him, and glancing over his
shoulder he saw Mrs. Burnham leave the elevator and walk toward his
apartment. Palmer stood for several seconds where he was; then, as Mrs.
Burnham was admitted by his Japanese servant, Siki, he slowly retraced
his footsteps to his apartment.
Inside the living room Hayden listened to a long winded statement from
one of his patients, and making his replies as brief as politeness
permitted he finally hung up the receiver and, swinging about, found
Mrs. Burnham seated near at hand.
“I telephoned to your office and the boy told me you were not expected
there this morning, so I chanced finding you here,” she explained as
they shook hands. “I want your professional advice.”
“Surely, Mrs. Burnham.” Hayden drew a chair forward and sat down by
her. “What is it?”
Mrs. Burnham did not reply at once. “Are we likely to be interrupted?”
she finally inquired.
“No,” replied Hayden. “Palmer left before you came, and Siki is busy in
his pantry.”
Mrs. Burnham’s tense manner relaxed somewhat. “I want to speak to you
on confidential matters,” she said. “You will kindly mention my visit
to no one.”
“Certainly not.” Hayden bowed. “Proceed, madam.”
It was some minutes before Mrs. Burnham again addressed him; she seemed
at first uncertain how to commence.
“I sent for you this summer to come to Chelsea,” she began, “so that
you might have Mr. Burnham under observation; I told you that at the
time.” Hayden bowed again. “You said then that you observed a tendency
on his part to brood and to withdraw himself from the society of his
friends.”
“True,” responded Hayden gravely. “His chief relaxation, aside from
long solitary walks, seemed to be to lock himself in some room and work
over chess problems. I advised you to use your influence to induce him
to be more with people.”
“I have tried to do so.” Mrs. Burnham was exerting her superb
self-control to keep her voice tranquil. “Without, however,
satisfactory results; now he even dislikes my society.”
Hayden glanced at her keenly. “A morbid tendency very often makes
people turn against those they love the most,” he said gently. “As
Burnham’s physical condition improves he will shake off his mental
depression. In my opinion, Mrs. Burnham,” he added more lightly, “half
the murders and suicides to-day are the result of a torpid liver.”
Mrs. Burnham’s answering smile was wan. “Then you think his, shall we
say, distorted views of people and events are the result of physical
illness reacting on his mental condition?”
“It is possible,” conceded Hayden; again he eyed her keenly. “You have
mentioned no specific case----”
“I am coming to that.” Mrs. Burnham bent forward in her earnestness.
“How much reliance can I place on my husband’s active dislike for
Captain René La Montagne and the charges he has brought against him?”
Hayden considered the question. “It is difficult to answer,” he
admitted, “I do not know the grounds, if any, your husband has for
hating--frankly, on the surface it amounts to that--” he added
hastily--“for hating the Frenchman.”
Mrs. Burnham colored painfully. “As I understand it, Captain La
Montagne was a passive witness of an unfortunate scene in a club in
Paris in which my husband did not--did not”--she faltered----“did not
cover himself with glory; but I must say, in justice to him, that he
was brought up in the tenets of the Quakers and dueling or fighting of
any kind is----”
“I know,” broke in Hayden kindly. “It is highly probable that Burnham
has become possessed of this notion, this dislike of La Montagne,
contradictory alike to common-sense and his own experience, until it
has developed into almost a monomania with him.”
Mrs. Burnham drew a long, long breath. “Then do you think he has
brooded over a long past incident and centered his resentment on La
Montagne until it has become an obsession?” she asked.
“Yes; so it seems to me.”
“Then you think he has taken the--the--shall we call it chance----”
Mrs. Burnham whitened--“the chance of that unidentified man having
been killed in our empty house, to involve Captain La Montagne in the
crime so as to punish him for an imaginary grievance,--in his mental
condition,--exaggerated out of all proportion to its real significance?”
“It may be,” Hayden hesitated, “but you must recollect that
circumstantial evidence also points to Captain La Montagne.”
“I do not place much confidence in circumstantial evidence,” declared
Mrs. Burnham. “Captain La Montagne if innocent, should have little
difficulty in proving it, but----” Mrs. Burnham cleared her voice of
a slight huskiness--“but I am willing to swear in any court that my
husband’s attitude toward him is due to mental irresponsibility.”
A spark of admiration kindled Hayden’s eyes as he gazed at the composed
woman seated before him; in his creed loyalty ranked high.
“Your claim seems justified by facts,” he said. “I would suggest----”
“What?”
“That you set the machinery in motion to have Mr. Burnham placed under
mental observation,” he added reluctantly.
Mrs. Burnham averted her gaze. “Only as a last resource,” she said.
“At present I wanted your views to assist me in deciding upon a course
of action.” She paused and he waited with silent attention. It was
some moments before she spoke again. “My daughter, Evelyn, wishes to
announce her engagement to Captain La Montagne to-day.”
“Oh!” Hayden sat back and contemplated her in surprise.
“Quite so.” Mrs. Burnham’s smile was wintry. “Evelyn’s behavior
complicates the situation,” she admitted with candor. “I have had quite
enough gossip about my private affairs;” her tone grew bitter. “People
perhaps do not think I know the things which were said at the time my
engagement to Mr. Burnham was announced, but there are always kind
friends;” she laughed mirthlessly. “Women do not spare their own sex,
doctor; even my daughter’s intimate friend, Marian Van Ness, stated I
only married Peter to get rid of him.”
The frantic ringing of the telephone bell interrupted her, and with a
hasty apology Hayden crossed the room to the instrument. Mrs. Burnham
seized the opportunity to relax in her chair; the interview had taxed
her strength. Happening to glance in the direction of the door she saw
the Japanese servant pass down the hall, long wall brush and dust pan
in hand; another instant and Dr. Hayden was back at her side.
“Evelyn is in a state of mind to do anything,” she stated, as he
resumed his seat. “She is quite as possessed in favor of Captain La
Montagne as my husband is opposed to him.”
“A pleasant situation for you,” acknowledged Hayden, and his
sympathetic manner was a tonic to her frayed nerves. “Do you anticipate
an elopement?”
“No, oh, no.” Mrs. Burnham spoke more rapidly than ordinarily. “Evelyn
simply desires the immediate public announcement of her engagement
under, in my opinion, a mistaken sense of loyalty to Captain La
Montagne. I have begged her to tell only her intimate friends and
relatives----”
“Ah! then you have agreed to the engagement?” asked Hayden quickly.
“Yes,” reluctantly. “Frankly, doctor, Evelyn’s condition this morning
worried me, and I thought the best thing to do was to accede as far as
possible to her wishes. It quieted her and she spent the remainder of
the night without seeing visions.”
“Visions!” exclaimed the astonished physician.
“Yes,” tartly. “I was awakened by a whistling noise which seemed to
come from Evelyn’s room, and on going in I found her sitting up in
bed, apparently frightened half out of her senses and declaring that
she saw against the opposite wall the unidentified dead man, sitting in
the chair as she had found him in the library on Tuesday afternoon.”
“Upon my word!” Hayden stared at Mrs. Burnham; she was certainly
serious in her statement. Was the entire Burnham household going mad,
or was his hearing defective?
“Evelyn seldom speaks of the scene in the library,” went on Mrs.
Burnham. “But finding the body must have made a greater impression upon
her than any of us realized. She was very much wrought up to a feverish
degree. Mrs. Ward told me this morning, by an interview she had with me
about René La Montagne just before going to bed, and I am afraid her
mind must have reverted back to the dead man and her mental distress
projected her vision of him on the wall,” ended Mrs. Burnham. “Isn’t
that what you physicians call it?”
Hayden looked puzzled. “An illusion--counterfeit appearances,” he
explained, “is an incorrect impression of the senses. Has Evelyn ever
had other illusions?”
“Never to my knowledge.” Mrs. Burnham rose. “I have left her in bed in
Mrs. Ward’s care. I wish you would come in sometime during the day
doctor, and see her. In the meantime, I can’t thank you enough----”
Mrs. Burnham’s fine eyes filled with tears and she stopped unable to
control her voice.
“My dear Mrs. Burnham,” Hayden shook her hand warmly. “Say no more; I
am only too delighted to be of service to you; you forget, but I do
not, your long years of kindness and hospitality to me.”
Taking her knitting bag from the sofa where she had dropped it, Mrs.
Burnham started for the door, and Hayden, snatching up his surgical bag
and hat, accompanied her out of the apartment and down in the elevator.
They had been gone fully five minutes before James Palmer rose from his
chair in the corner of the balcony and looked through the open window
into the empty living room.
“A clever woman, a very clever woman,” he commented aloud. Turning
abruptly he stepped through the French window opening into the hall of
his apartment and went in search of the Japanese, Siki.
“Go out on the balcony and put new electric bulbs in the bird-cage
lanterns,” he directed. “We want to sit out there to-night after
dinner.”
Not waiting for a reply he left the apartment and was just in time to
catch a descending elevator. The boy had shut the elevator door when
Palmer caught sight of Peter Burnham walking down the corridor, and he
had but time to call out: “Sorry to miss you; Hayden’s gone,” when the
elevator shot downward.
“I’ll wait for Hayden,” shouted Burnham, and a moment later was
explaining his presence and desires to the attentive Japanese.
Siki ushered him into the living room with a grand flourish, then went
off to execute his master’s orders with sublime disregard of Burnham’s
presence.
The morning papers first engaged Burnham’s attention; the chess table
added its fascination, but finally, tiring of both occupations, he
wandered over to the window opening upon the balcony, a tinkle of glass
having attracted his notice. He stood for some seconds looking out at
the Jap sweeping up pieces of a broken electric bulb and watched him
screw another in place in one of the silk-lined bird-cage lanterns.
“Siki,” he called. “Come here,” and as the Jap approached the window he
drew out a twenty dollar bill.
“See here, Siki,” he began insinuatingly. “You know Captain La Montagne
was in this apartment Thursday night just before the attempt was made
to shoot me.”
The Jap looked first at the bill and then at Burnham, his expression
inscrutable.
“Me understand, honorable sir,” he admitted and pocketed the money.