BOOK I.

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HAND AND RING

by

ANNA KATHARINE GREEN

* * * * *

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

=The Leavenworth Case.= A LAWYER'S STORY. 16mo, cloth,

$1.00; paper, 50 cents; 4to, paper 20

=A Strange Disappearance.= 16mo, cloth, $1.00; paper 50

=The Sword of Damocles.= 16mo, cloth, $1.00; paper 50

=X. Y. Z.= A DETECTIVE STORY. 16mo, paper 25

=The Defence of the Bride, and other Poems.= Square,

8vo., flexible cloth 1 00

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, PUBLISHERS,

NEW YORK AND LONDON.

* * * * *

[Illustration: "'Look out,' cried the detective, 'or you will get

yourself into trouble,' and he tightened his grip on the old creature's

arm."--(Page 43.) (_Frontispiece_.)]

HAND AND RING

by

ANNA KATHARINE GREEN

Author of "The Leavenworth Case", "The Sword of Damocles", "The

Defense of the Bride" Etc., Etc.

"For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak

with most miraculous organ."

G. P. Putnam's Sons

New York: 27 & 29 West 23d Street

London: 25 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden

1883

Copyright by

Anna Katharine Green

1883

Press of

G. P. Putnam's Sons

New York

CONTENTS.

_BOOK I._

THE GENTLEMAN FROM TOLEDO.

CHAPTER PAGE

I. A Startling Coincidence 1

II. An Appeal to Heaven 17

III. The Unfinished Letter 31

IV. Imogene 49

V. Horace Byrd 67

VI. The Skill of an Artist 85

VII. Miss Firman 95

VIII. The Thick-set Man 115

IX. Close Calculations 128

X. The Final Test 146

XI. Decision 162

_BOOK II._

THE WEAVING OF A WEB.

XII. The Spider 168

XIII. The Fly 175

XIV. A Last Attempt 189

XV. The End of a Tortuous Path 199

XVI. Storm 205

XVII. A Surprise 213

XVIII. A Brace of Detectives 214

XIX. Mr. Ferris 233

XX. A Crisis 245

XXI. A Heart's Martyrdom 258

XXII. Craik Mansell 264

XXIII. Mr. Orcutt 278

XXIV. A True Bill 299

XXV. Among Telescopes and Charts 306

XXVI. "He Shall Hear Me!" 313

_BOOK III._

THE SCALES OF JUSTICE.

XXVII. The Great Trial 315

XXVIII. The Chief Witness for the Prosecution 322

XXIX. The Opening of the Defence 350

XXX. Byrd Uses his Pencil Again 356

XXXI. The Chief Witness for the Defence 369

XXXII. Hickory 383

XXXIII. A Late Discovery 392

XXXIV. What Was Hid Behind Imogene's Veil 411

XXXV. Pro and Con 436

XXXVI. A Mistake Rectified 465

XXXVII. Under the Great Tree 475

XXXVIII. Unexpected Words 502

XXXIX. Mr. Gryce 516

XL. In the Prison 529

XLI. A Link Supplied 555

XLII. Consultations 568

XLIII. Mrs. Firman 573

XLIV. The Widow Clemmens 587

XLV. Mr. Gryce Says Good-bye 600

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE

"'Look out,' cried the detective, 'or you will get yourself

into trouble,' and he tightened his grip on the old

creature's arm." _Frontispiece_

"Taking her hand in his, he looked at her long and

searchingly. 'Imogene,' he exclaimed, 'there is

something weighing on your heart.'" 58

"He paused, sick and horror-stricken. Her face had risen

upon him from the back of the chair, and was staring

at him like that of a Medusa." 252

Diagram 364

"The curtains parted and disclosed the form of Imogene.

'I am coming,' she murmured, and stepped forth." 402

NOTE.--A portion of these illustrations originally

appeared in _Frank Leslie's Illustrated

Newspaper_, and have been used in this volume

through the courtesy of Mrs. Leslie.

HAND AND RING.

BOOK I.

THE GENTLEMAN FROM TOLEDO.

I.

A STARTLING COINCIDENCE.

By the pricking of my thumbs,

Something wicked this way comes.

--MACBETH.

THE town clock of Sibley had just struck twelve. Court had adjourned,

and Judge Evans, with one or two of the leading lawyers of the county,

stood in the door-way of the court-house discussing in a friendly way

the eccentricities of criminals as developed in the case then before the

court. Mr. Lord had just ventured the assertion that crime as a fine art

was happily confined to France; to which District Attorney Ferris had

replied:

"And why? Because atheism has not yet acquired such a hold upon our

upper classes that gentlemen think it possible to meddle with such

matters. It is only when a student, a doctor, a lawyer, determines to

put aside from his path the secret stumbling-block to his desires or

his ambition that the true intellectual crime is developed. That brute

whom you see slouching along over the way is the type of the average

criminal of the day."

And he indicated with a nod a sturdy, ill-favored man, who, with pack on

his back, was just emerging from a grassy lane that opened out from the

street directly opposite the court-house.

"Such men are often seen in the dock," remarked Mr. Orcutt, of more than

local reputation as a criminal lawyer. "And often escape the penalty of

their crimes," he added, watching, with a curious glance, the lowering

brow and furtive look of the man who, upon perceiving the attention he

had attracted, increased his pace till he almost broke into a run.

"Looks as if he had been up to mischief," observed Judge Evans.

"Rather as if he had heard the sentence which was passed upon the last

tramp who paid his respects to this town," corrected Mr. Lord.

"Revenons a nos moutons," resumed the District Attorney. "Crime, as an

investment, does not pay in this country. The regular burglar leads a

dog's life of it; and when you come to the murderer, how few escape

suspicion if they do the gallows. I do not know of a case where a murder

for money has been really successful in this region."

"Then you must have some pretty cute detective work going on here,"

remarked a young man who had not before spoken.

"No, no--nothing to brag of. But the brutes are so clumsy--that is the

word, clumsy. They don't know how to cover up their tracks."

"The smart ones don't make tracks," interposed a rough voice near them,

and a large, red-haired, slightly hump-backed man, who, from the looks

of those about, was evidently a stranger in the place, shuffled forward

from the pillar against which he had been leaning, and took up the

thread of conversation.

"I tell you," he continued, in a gruff tone somewhat out of keeping with

the studied abstraction of his keen, gray eye, "that half the criminals

are caught because they do make tracks and then resort to such

extraordinary means to cover them up. The true secret of success in this

line lies in striking your blow with a weapon picked up on the spot, and

in choosing for the scene of your tragedy a thoroughfare where, in the

natural course of events, other men will come and go and unconsciously

tread out your traces, provided you have made any. This dissipates

suspicion, or starts it in so many directions that justice is at once

confused, if not ultimately baffled. Look at that house yonder," the

stranger pursued, pointing to a plain dwelling on the opposite corner.

"While we have been standing here, several persons of one kind or

another, and among them a pretty rough-looking tramp, have gone into the

side gate and so around to the kitchen door and back. I don't know who

lives there, but say it is a solitary old woman above keeping help, and

that an hour from now some one, not finding her in the house, searches

through the garden and comes upon her lying dead behind the wood-pile,

struck down by her own axe. On whom are you going to lay your hand in

suspicion? On the stranger, of course--the rough-looking tramp that

everybody thinks is ready for bloodshed at the least provocation. But

suspicion is not conviction, and I would dare wager that no court, in

face of a persistent denial on his part that he even saw the old woman

when he went to her door, would bring in a verdict of murder against

him, even though silver from her private drawer were found concealed

upon his person. The chance that he spoke the truth, and that she was

not in the house when he entered, and that his crime had been merely one

of burglary or theft, would be enough to save him from the hangman."

"That is true," assented Mr. Lord, "unless all the other persons who had

been seen to go into the yard were not only reputable men, but were

willing to testify to having seen the woman alive up to the time he

invaded her premises."

But the hump-backed stranger had already lounged away.

"What do you think about this, Mr. Byrd?" inquired the District

Attorney, turning to the young man before alluded to. "You are an expert

in these matters, or ought to be. What would you give for the tramp's

chances if the detectives took him in hand?"

"I, sir?" was the response. "I am so comparatively young and

inexperienced in such affairs, that I scarcely dare presume to express

an opinion. But I have heard it said by Mr. Gryce, who you know stands

foremost among the detectives of New York, that the only case of murder

in which he utterly failed to get any clue to work upon, was that of a

Jew who was knocked down in his own shop in broad daylight. But this

will not appear so strange when you learn the full particulars. The

store was situated between two alley-ways in Harlem. It had an entrance

back and an entrance front. Both were in constant use. The man was found

behind his counter, having evidently been hit on the head by a

slung-shot while reaching for a box of hosiery. But though a succession

of people were constantly passing by both doors, there was for that very

reason no one to tell which of all the men who were observed to enter

the shop, came out again with blood upon his conscience. Nor were the

circumstances of the Jew's life such as to assist justice. The most

careful investigation failed to disclose the existence of any enemy, nor

was he found to possess in this country, at least, any relative who

could have hoped to be benefited by the few dollars he had saved from a

late bankruptcy. The only conclusion to be drawn is that the man was

secretly in the way of some one and was as secretly put out of it, but

for what purpose or by whose hand, time has never disclosed."

"There is one, however, who knows both," affirmed Judge Evans,

impressively.

"The man himself?"

"God!"

The solemnity with which this was uttered caused a silence, during which

Mr. Orcutt looked at his watch.

"I must go to dinner," he announced, withdrawing, with a slight nod,

across the street.

The rest stood for a few minutes abstractedly contemplating his

retreating figure, as with an energetic pace all his own he passed down

the little street that opened opposite to where they stood, and entered

the unpretending cottage of a widow lady, with whom he was in the habit

of taking his mid-day meal whenever he had a case before the court.

A lull was over the whole village, and the few remaining persons on the

court-house steps were about to separate, when Mr. Lord uttered an

exclamation and pointed to the cottage into which they had just seen Mr.

Orcutt disappear. Immediately all eyes looked that way and saw the

lawyer standing on the stoop, having evidently issued with the utmost

precipitation from the house.

"He is making signs," cried Mr. Lord to Mr. Ferris; and scarcely knowing

what they feared, both gentlemen crossed the way and hurried down the

street toward their friend, who, with unusual tokens of disturbance in

his manner, ran forward to meet them.

"A murder!" he excitedly exclaimed, as soon as he came within speaking

distance. "A strange and startling coincidence. Mrs. Clemmens has been

struck on the head, and is lying covered with blood at the foot of her

dining-room table."

Mr. Lord and the District Attorney stared at each other in a maze of

surprise and horror easily to be comprehended, and then they rushed

forward.

"Wait a moment," the latter suddenly cried, stopping short and looking

back. "Where is the fellow who talked so learnedly about murder and the

best way of making a success of it. He must be found at once. I don't

believe in coincidences." And he beckoned to the person they had called

Byrd, who with very pardonable curiosity was hurrying their way. "Go

find Hunt, the constable," he cried; "tell him to stop and retain the

humpback. A woman here has been found murdered, and that fellow must

have known something about it."

The young man stared, flushed with sudden intelligence, and darted off.

Mr. Ferris turned, found Mr. Orcutt still at his side, and drew him

forward to rejoin Mr. Lord, who by this time was at the door of the

cottage.

They all went in together, Mr. Ferris, who was of an adventurous

disposition, leading the way. The room into which they first stepped was

empty. It was evidently the widow's sitting-room, and was in perfect

order, with the exception of Mr. Orcutt's hat, which lay on the

centre-table where he had laid it on entering. Neat, without being

prim, the entire aspect of the place was one of comfort, ease, and

modest luxury. For, though the Widow Clemmens lived alone and without

help, she was by no means an indigent person, as a single glance at her

house would show. The door leading into the farther room was open, and

toward this they hastened, led by the glitter of the fine old china

service which loaded the dining-table.

"She is there," said Mr. Orcutt, pointing to the other side of the room.

They immediately passed behind the table, and there, sure enough, lay

the prostrate figure of the widow, her head bleeding, her arms extended,

one hand grasping her watch, which she had loosened from her belt, the

other stretched toward a stick of firewood, that, from the mark of blood

upon its side, had evidently been used to fell her to the floor. She was

motionless as stone, and was, to all appearance, dead.

"Sickening, sickening!--horrible!" exclaimed Mr. Lord, recoiling upon

the District Attorney with a gesture, as if he would put the frightful

object out of his sight. "What motive could any one have for killing

such an inoffensive woman? The deviltry of man is beyond belief!"

"And after what we have heard, inexplicable," asserted Mr. Ferris. "To

be told of a supposable case of murder one minute, and then to see it

exemplified in this dreadful way the next, is an experience of no common

order. I own I am overcome by it." And he flung open a door that

communicated with the lane and let the outside air sweep in.

"That door was unlocked," remarked Mr. Lord, glancing at Mr. Orcutt, who

stood with severe, set face, looking down at the outstretched form

which, for several years now, had so often sat opposite to him at his

noonday meal.

With a start the latter looked up. "What did you say? The door unlocked?

There is nothing strange in that. She never locked her doors, though she

was so very deaf I often advised her to." And he allowed his eyes to run

over the wide stretch of low, uncultivated ground before him, that, in

the opinion of many persons, was such a decided blot upon the town.

"There is no one in sight," he reluctantly admitted.

"No," responded the other. "The ground is unfavorable for escape. It is

marshy and covered with snake grass. A man could make his way, however,

between the hillocks into those woods yonder, if he were driven by fear

or understood the path well. What is the matter, Orcutt?"

"Nothing," affirmed the latter,--"nothing, I thought I heard a groan."

"You heard me make an exclamation," spoke up Mr. Ferris, who by this

time had sufficiently overcome his emotion to lift the head of the

prostrate woman and look in her face. "This woman is not dead."

"What!" they both cried, bounding forward.

"See, she breathes," continued the former, pointing to her slowly

laboring chest. "The villain, whoever he was, did not do his work well;

she may be able to tell us something yet."

"I do not think so," murmured Mr. Orcutt. "Such a blow as that must have

destroyed her faculties, if not her life. It was of cruel force."

"However that may be, she ought to be taken care of now," cried Mr.

Ferris. "I wish Dr. Tredwell was here."

"I will go for him," signified the other.

But it was not necessary. Scarcely had the lawyer turned to execute this

mission, when a sudden murmur was heard at the door, and a dozen or so

citizens burst into the house, among them the very person named. Being

coroner as well as physician, he at once assumed authority. The widow

was carried into her room, which was on the same floor, and a brother

practitioner sent for, who took his place at her head and waited for any

sign of returning consciousness. The crowd, remanded to the yard, spent

their time alternately in furtive questionings of each other's

countenances, and in eager look-out for the expected return of the

strange young man who had been sent after the incomprehensible humpback

of whom all had heard. The coroner, closeted with the District Attorney

in the dining-room, busied himself in noting certain evident facts.

"I am, perhaps, forestalling my duties in interfering before the woman

is dead," intimated the former. "But it is only a matter of a few hours,

and any facts we can glean in the interim must be of value to a proper

conduct of the inquiry I shall be called upon to hold. I shall therefore

make the same note of the position of affairs as I would do if she were

dead; and to begin with, I wish you to observe that she was hit while

setting the clock." And he pointed to the open door of the huge

old-fashioned timepiece which occupied that corner of the room in which

she had been found. "She had not even finished her task," he next

remarked, "for the clock is still ten minutes slow, while her watch is

just right, as you will see by comparing it with your own. She was

attacked from behind, and to all appearances unexpectedly. Had she

turned, her forehead would have been struck, while, as all can see, it

is the back of her head that has suffered, and that from a right-hand

blow. Her deafness was undoubtedly the cause of her immobility under the

approach of such an assailant. She did not hear his step, and, being so

busily engaged, saw nothing of the cruel hand uplifted to destroy her. I

doubt if she even knew what happened. The mystery is that any one could

have sufficiently desired her death to engage in such a cold-blooded

butchery. If plunder were wanted, why was not her watch taken from her?

And see, here is a pile of small change lying beside her plate on the

table,--a thing a tramp would make for at once."

"It was not a thief that struck her."

"Well, well, we don't know. I have my own theory," admitted the coroner;

"but, of course, it will not do for me to mention it here. The stick was

taken from that pile laid ready on the hearth," he went on. "Odd,

significantly odd, that in all its essential details this affair should

tally so completely with the supposable case of crime given a moment

before by the deformed wretch you tell me about."

"Not if that man was a madman and the assailant," suggested the District

Attorney.

"True, but I do not think he was mad--not from what you have told me.

But let us see what the commotion is. Some one has evidently arrived."

It was Mr. Byrd, who had entered by the front door, and deaf to the low

murmur of the impatient crowd without, stood waiting in silent patience

for an opportunity to report to the District Attorney the results of his

efforts.

Mr. Ferris at once welcomed him.

"What have you done? Did you find the constable or succeed in laying

hands on that scamp of a humpback?"

Mr. Byrd, who, to explain at once, was a young and intelligent

detective, who had been brought from New York for purposes connected

with the case then before the court, glanced carefully in the direction

of the coroner and quietly replied:

"The hump-backed scamp, as you call him, has disappeared. Whether he

will be found or not I cannot say. Hunt is on his track, and will report

to you in an hour. The tramp whom you saw slinking out of this street

while we stood on the court-house steps is doubtless the man whom you

most want, and him we have captured."

"You have?" repeated Mr. Ferris, eying, with good-natured irony, the

young man's gentlemanly but rather indifferent face. "And what makes you

think it is the tramp who is the guilty one in this case? Because that

ingenious stranger saw fit to make him such a prominent figure in his

suppositions?"

"No, sir," replied the detective, flushing with a momentary

embarrassment he however speedily overcame; "I do not found my opinions

upon any man's remarks. I only---- Excuse me," said he, with a quiet air

of self-control that was not without its effect upon the sensible man he

was addressing. "If you will tell me how, where, and under what

circumstances this poor murdered woman was found, perhaps I shall be

better able to explain my reasons for believing in the tramp as the

guilty party; though the belief, even of a detective, goes for but

little in matters of this kind, as you and these other gentlemen very

well know."

"Step here, then," signified Mr. Ferris, who, accompanied by the

coroner, had already passed around the table. "Do you see that clock?

She was winding it when she was struck, and fell almost at its foot.

The weapon which did the execution lies over there; it is a stick of

firewood, as you see, and was caught up from that pile on the hearth.

Now recall what that humpback said about choosing a thoroughfare for a

murder (and this house is a thoroughfare), and the peculiar stress which

he laid upon the choice of a weapon, and tell me why you think he is

innocent of this immediate and most remarkable exemplification of his

revolting theory?"

"Let me first ask," ventured the other, with a remaining tinge of

embarrassment coloring his cheek, "if you have reason to think this

woman had been lying long where she was found, or was she struck soon

before the discovery?"

"Soon. The dinner was still smoking in the kitchen, where it had been

dished up ready for serving."

"Then," declared the detective with sudden confidence, "a single word

will satisfy you that the humpback was not the man who delivered this

stroke. To lay that woman low at the foot of this clock would require

the presence of the assailant in the room. Now, the humpback was not

here this morning, but in the court-room. I know this, for I saw him

there."

"You did? You are sure of that?" cried, in a breath, both his hearers,

somewhat taken aback by this revelation.

"Yes. He sat down by the door. I noticed him particularly."

"Humph! that is odd," quoth Mr. Ferris, with the testiness of an

irritable man who sees himself contradicted in a publicly expressed

theory.

"Very odd," repeated the coroner; "so odd, I am inclined to think he did

not sit there every moment of the time. It is but a step from the

court-house here; he might well have taken the trip and returned while

you wiped your eye-glasses or was otherwise engaged."

Mr. Byrd did not see fit to answer this.

"The tramp is an ugly-looking customer," he remarked, in what was almost

a careless tone of voice.

Mr. Ferris covered with his hand the pile of loose change that was yet

lying on the table, and shortly observed:

"A tramp to commit such a crime must be actuated either by rage or

cupidity; that you will acknowledge. Now the fellow who struck this

woman could not have been excited by any sudden anger, for the whole

position of her body when found proves that she had not even turned to

face the intruder, much less engaged in an altercation with him. Yet how

could it have been money he was after, when a tempting bit like this

remained undisturbed upon the table?"

And Mr. Ferris, with a sudden gesture, disclosed to view the pile of

silver coin he had been concealing.

The young detective shook his head but lost none of his seeming

indifference. "That is one of the little anomalies of criminal

experience that we were talking about this morning," he remarked.

"Perhaps the fellow was frightened and lost his head, or perhaps he

really heard some one at the door, and was obliged to escape without

reaping any of the fruits of his crime."

"Perhaps and perhaps," retorted Mr. Ferris, who was a quick man, and

who, once settled in a belief, was not to be easily shaken out of it.

"However that may be," continued Mr. Byrd, without seeming to notice the

irritating interruption, "I still think that the tramp, rather than the

humpback, will be the man to occupy your future attention."

And with a deprecatory bow to both gentlemen, he drew back and quietly

left the room.

Mr. Ferris at once recovered from his momentary loss of temper.

"I suppose the young man is right," he acknowledged; "but, if so, what

an encouragement we have received this morning to a belief in

clairvoyance." And with less irony and more conviction, he added: "The

humpback _must_ have known something about the murder."

And the coroner bowed; common-sense undoubtedly agreeing with this

assumption.

II.

AN APPEAL TO HEAVEN.

Her step was royal--queen-like.--LONGFELLOW.

IT was now half-past one. An hour and a half had elapsed since the widow

had been laid upon her bed, and to all appearance no change had taken

place in her condition. Within the room where she lay were collected the

doctor and one or two neighbors of the female sex, who watched every

breath she drew, and stood ready to notice the slightest change in the

stony face that, dim with the shadow of death, stared upon them from the

unruffled pillows. In the sitting-room Lawyer Orcutt conversed in a

subdued voice with Mr. Ferris, in regard to such incidents of the

widow's life as had come under his notice in the years of their daily

companionship, while the crowd about the gate vented their interest in

loud exclamations of wrath against the tramp who had been found, and the

unknown humpback who had not. Our story leads us into the crowd in

front.

"I don't think she'll ever come to," said one, who from his dusty coat

might have been a miller. "Blows like that haven't much let-up about

them."

"Doctor says she will die before morning," put in a pert young miss,

anxious to have her voice heard.

"Then it will be murder and no mistake, and that brute of a tramp will

hang as high as Haman."

"Don't condemn a man before you've had a chance to hear what he has to

say for himself," cried another in a strictly judicial tone. "How do you

know as he came to this house at all?"

"Miss Perkins says he did, and Mrs. Phillips too; they saw him go into

the gate."

"And what else did they see? I warrant he wasn't the only beggar that

was roaming round this morning."

"No; there was a tin peddler in the street, for I saw him my own self,

and Mrs. Clemmens standing in the door flourishing her broom at him. She

was mighty short with such folks. Wouldn't wonder if some of the unholy

wretches killed her out of spite. They're a wicked lot, the whole of

them."

"Widow Clemmens had a quick temper, but she had a mighty good heart

notwithstanding. See how kind she was to them Hubbells."

"And how hard she was to that Pratt girl."

"Well, I know, but----" And so on and so on, in a hum and a buzz about

the head of Mr. Byrd, who, engaged in thought seemingly far removed from

the subject in hand, stood leaning against the fence, careless and

_insouciant_. Suddenly there was a lull, then a short cry, then a

woman's voice rose clear, ringing, and commanding, and Mr. Byrd caught

the following words:

"What is this I hear? Mrs. Clemmens dead? Struck down by some wandering

tramp? Murdered and in her own house?"

In an instant, every eye, including Mr. Byrd's, was fixed upon the

speaker. The crowd parted, and the young girl, who had spoken from the

street, came into the gate. She was a remarkable-looking person. Tall,

large, and majestic in every proportion of an unusually noble figure,

she was of a make and possessed a bearing to attract attention had she

borne a less striking and beautiful countenance. As it was, the glance

lingered but a moment on the grand curves and lithe loveliness of that

matchless figure, and passed at once to the face. Once there, it did not

soon wander; for though its beauty was incontestable, the something that

lay behind that beauty was more incontestable still, and held you, in

spite of yourself, long after you had become acquainted with the broad

white brow, the clear, deep, changing gray eye, the straight but

characteristic nose, and the ruddy, nervous lip. You felt that, young

and beautiful as she was, and charming as she might be, she was also one

of nature's unsolvable mysteries--a woman whom you might study, obey,

adore, but whom you could never hope to understand; a Sphinx without an

Oedipus. She was dressed in dark green, and held her gloves in her

hand. Her appearance was that of one who had been profoundly startled.

"Why don't some one answer me?" she asked, after an instant's pause,

seemingly unconscious that, alike to those who knew her and to those

who did not, her air and manner were such as to naturally impose

silence. "Must I go into the house in order to find out if this good

woman is dead or not?"

"Shure she isn't dead yet," spoke up a brawny butcher-boy, bolder than

the rest. "But she's sore hurt, miss, and the doctors say as how there

is no hope."

A change impossible to understand passed over the girl's face. Had she

been less vigorous of body, she would have staggered. As it was, she

stood still, rigidly still, and seemed to summon up her faculties, till

the very clinch of her fingers spoke of the strong control she was

putting upon herself.

"It is dreadful, dreadful!" she murmured, this time in a whisper, and as

if to some rising protest in her own soul. "No good can come of it,

none." Then, as if awakening to the scene about her, shook her head and

cried to those nearest: "It was a tramp who did it, I suppose; at least,

I am told so."

"A tramp has been took up, miss, on suspicion, as they call it."

"If a tramp has been taken up on suspicion, then he was the one who

assailed her, of course." And pushing on through the crowd that fell

back still more awe-struck than before, she went into the house.

The murmur that followed her was subdued but universal. It made no

impression on Mr. Byrd. He had leaned forward to watch the girl's

retreating form, but, finding his view intercepted by the wrinkled

profile of an old crone who had leaned forward too, had drawn

impatiently back. Something in that crone's aged face made him address

her.

"You know the lady?" he inquired.

"Yes," was the cautious reply, given, however, with a leer he found not

altogether pleasant.

"She is a relative of the injured woman, or a friend, perhaps?"

The old woman's face looked frightful.

"No," she muttered grimly; "they are strangers."

At this unexpected response Mr. Byrd made a perceptible start forward.

The old woman's hand fell at once on his arm.

"Stay!" she hoarsely whispered. "By strangers I mean they don't visit

each other. The town is too small for any of us to be strangers."

Mr. Byrd nodded and escaped her clutch.

"This is worth seeing through," he murmured, with the first gleam of

interest he had shown in the affair. And, hurrying forward, he succeeded

in following the lady into the house.

The sight he met there did not tend to allay his newborn interest. There

she stood in the centre of the sitting-room, tall, resolute, and

commanding, her eyes fixed on the door of the room that contained the

still breathing sufferer, Mr. Orcutt's eyes fixed upon her. It seemed as

if she had asked one question and been answered; there had not been time

for more.

"I do not know what to say in apology for my intrusion," she remarked.

"But the death, or almost the death, of a person of whom we have all

heard, seems to me so terrible that----"

But here Mr. Orcutt interrupted gently, almost tenderly, but with a

fatherly authority which Mr. Byrd expected to see her respect.

"Imogene," he observed, "this is no place for you; the horror of the

event has made you forget yourself; go home and trust me to tell you on

my return all that it is advisable for you to know."

But she did not even meet his glance with her steady eyes. "Thank you,"

she protested; "but I cannot go till I have seen the place where this

woman fell and the weapon with which she was struck. I want to see it

all. Mr. Ferris, will you show me?" And without giving any reason for

this extraordinary request, she stood waiting with that air of conscious

authority which is sometimes given by great beauty when united to a

distinguished personal presence.

The District Attorney, taken aback, moved toward the dining-room door.

"I will consult with the coroner," said he.

But she waited for no man's leave. Following close behind him, she

entered upon the scene of the tragedy.

"Where was the poor woman hit?" she inquired.

They told her; they showed her all she desired and asked her no

questions. She awed them, all but Mr. Orcutt--him she both astonished

and alarmed.

"And a tramp did all this?" she finally exclaimed, in the odd, musing

tone she had used once before, while her eye fell thoughtfully to the

floor. Suddenly she started, or so Mr. Byrd fondly imagined, and moved a

pace, setting her foot carefully down upon a certain spot in the carpet

beneath her.

"She has spied something," he thought, and watched to see if she would

stoop.

But no, she held herself still more erectly than before, and seemed, by

her rather desultory inquiries, to be striving to engage the attention

of the others from herself.

"There is some one surely tapping at this door," she intimated, pointing

to the one that opened into the lane.

Dr. Tredwell moved to see.

"Is there not?" she repeated, glancing at Mr. Ferris.

He, too, turned to see.

But there was still an eye regarding her from behind the sitting-room

door, and, perceiving it, she impatiently ceased her efforts. She was

not mistaken about the tapping. A man was at the door whom both

gentlemen seemed to know.

"I come from the tavern where they are holding this tramp in custody,"

announced the new-comer in a voice too low to penetrate into the room.

"He is frightened almost out of his wits. Seems to think he was taken up

for theft, and makes no bones of saying that he did take a spoon or two

from a house where he was let in for a bite. He gave up the spoons and

expects to go to jail, but seems to have no idea that any worse

suspicion is hanging over him. Those that stand around think he is

innocent of the murder."

"Humph! well, we will see," ejaculated Mr. Ferris; and, turning back, he

met, with a certain sort of complacence, the eyes of the young lady who

had been somewhat impatiently awaiting his reappearance. "It seems there

are doubts, after all, about the tramp being the assailant."

The start she gave was sudden and involuntary. She took a step forward

and then paused as if hesitating. Instantly, Mr. Byrd, who had not

forgotten the small object she had been covering with her foot,

sauntered leisurely forward, and, spying a ring on the floor where she

had been standing, unconcernedly picked it up.

She did not seem to notice him. Looking at Mr. Ferris with eyes whose

startled, if not alarmed, expression she did not succeed in hiding from

the detective, she inquired, in a stifled voice:

"What do you mean? What has this man been telling you? You say it was

not the tramp. Who, then, was it?"

"That is a question we cannot answer," rejoined Mr. Ferris, astonished

at her heat, while Lawyer Orcutt, moving forward, attempted once more to

recall her to herself.

"Imogene," he pleaded,--"Imogene, calm yourself. This is not a matter of

so much importance to you that you need agitate yourself so violently in

regard to it. Come home, I beseech you, and leave the affairs of

justice to the attention of those whose duty it is to look after them."

But beyond acknowledging his well-meant interference by a deprecatory

glance, she stood immovable, looking from Dr. Tredwell to Mr. Ferris,

and back again to Dr. Tredwell, as if she sought in their faces some

confirmation of a hideous doubt or fear that had arisen in her own mind.

Suddenly she felt a touch on her arm.

"Excuse me, madam, but is this yours?" inquired a smooth and careless

voice over her shoulder.

As though awakening from a dream she turned; they all turned. Mr. Byrd

was holding out in his open palm a ring blazing with a diamond of no

mean lustre or value.

The sight of such a jewel, presented at such a moment, completed the

astonishment of her friends. Pressing forward, they stared at the costly

ornament and then at her, Mr. Orcutt's face especially assuming a

startled expression of mingled surprise and apprehension, that soon

attracted the attention of the others, and led to an interchange of

looks that denoted a mutual but not unpleasant understanding.

"I found it at your feet," explained the detective, still carelessly,

but with just that delicate shade of respect in his voice necessary to

express a gentleman's sense of presumption in thus addressing a strange

and beautiful young lady.

The tone, if not the explanation, seemed to calm her, as powerful

natures are calmed in the stress of a sudden crisis.

"Thank you," she returned, not without signs of great sweetness in her

look and manner. "Yes, it is mine," she added slowly, reaching out her

hand and taking the ring. "I must have dropped it without knowing it."

And meeting the eye of Mr. Orcutt fixed upon her with that startled look

of inquiry already alluded to, she flushed, but placed the jewel

nonchalantly on her finger.

This cool appropriation of something he had no reason to believe hers,

startled the youthful detective immeasurably. He had not expected such a

_denouement_ to the little drama he had prepared with such quiet

assurance, and, though with the quick self-control that distinguished

him he forbore to show his surprise, he none the less felt baffled and

ill at ease, all the more that the two gentlemen present, who appeared

to be the most disinterested in their regard for this young lady, seemed

to accept this act on her part as genuine, and therefore not to be

questioned.

"It is a clue that is lost," thought he. "I have made a mess of my first

unassisted efforts at real detective work." And, inwardly disgusted with

himself, he drew back into the other room and took up his stand at a

remote window.

The slight stir he made in crossing the room seemed to break a spell and

restore the minds of all present to their proper balance. Mr. Orcutt

threw off the shadow that had momentarily disturbed his quiet and

assured mien, and advancing once more, held out his arm with even more

kindness than before, saying impressively:

"Now you will surely consent to accompany me home. You cannot mean to

remain here any longer, can you, Imogene?"

But before she could reply, before her hand could lay itself on his arm,

a sudden hush like that of awe passed solemnly through the room, and the

physician, who had been set to watch over the dying gasps of the poor

sufferer within, appeared on the threshold of the bedroom door, holding

up his hand with a look that at once commanded attention and awoke the

most painful expectancy in the hearts of all who beheld him:

"She stirs; she moves her lips," he announced, and again paused,

listening.

Immediately there was a sound from the dimness behind him, a low sound,

inarticulate at first, but presently growing loud enough and plain

enough to be heard in the utmost recesses of the furthermost room on

that floor.

"Hand! ring!" was the burden of the short ejaculation they heard. "Ring!

hand!" till a sudden gasp cut short the fearful iteration, and all was

silent again.

"Great heavens!" came in an awe-struck whisper from Mr. Ferris, as he

pressed hastily toward the place from which these words had issued.

But the physician at once stopped and silenced him.

"She may speak again," he suggested. "Wait."

But, though they listened breathlessly, and with ever-growing suspense,

no further break occurred in the deep silence, and soon the doctor

announced:

"She has sunk back into her old state; she may rouse again, and she may

not."

As though released from some painful tension, the coroner, the District

Attorney, and the detective all looked up. They found Miss Dare standing

by the open window, with her face turned to the landscape, and Mr.

Orcutt gazing at her with an expression of perplexity that had almost

the appearance of dismay. This look passed instantly from the lawyer's

countenance as he met the eyes of his friends, but Mr. Byrd, who was

still smarting under a sense of his late defeat, could not but wonder

what that gentleman had seen in Miss Dare, during the period of their

late preoccupation, to call up such an expression to his usually keen

and composed face.

The clinch of her white hand on the window-sill told nothing; but when

in a few moments later she turned toward them again, Mr. Byrd saw, or

thought he saw, the last lingering remains of a great horror fading out

of her eyes, and was not surprised when she walked up to Mr. Orcutt and

said, somewhat hoarsely: "I wish to go home now. This place is a

terrible one to be in."

Mr. Orcutt, who was only too glad to comply with her request, again

offered her his arm. But anxious as they evidently were to quit the

house, they were not allowed to do so without experiencing another

shock. Just as they were passing the door of the room where the wounded

woman lay, the physician in attendance again appeared before them with

that silently uplifted hand.

"Hush!" said he; "she stirs again. I think she is going to speak."

And once more that terrible suspense held each and every one enthralled:

once more that faint, inarticulate murmur eddied through the house,

growing gradually into speech that this time took a form that curdled

the blood of the listeners, and made Mr. Orcutt and the young woman at

his side drop apart from each other as though a dividing sword had

passed between them.

"May the vengeance of Heaven light upon the head of him who has brought

me to this pass," were the words that now rose ringing and clear from

that bed of death. "May the fate that has come upon me be visited upon

him, measure for measure, blow for blow, death for death."

Strange and awe-inspiring words, that drew a pall over that house and

made the dullest person there gasp for breath. In the silence that

followed--a silence that could be felt--the white faces of lawyer and

physician, coroner and detective, turned and confronted each other. But

the young lady who lingered in their midst looked at no one, turned to

no one. Shuddering and white, she stood gazing before her as if she

already beheld that retributive hand descending upon the head of the

guilty; then, as she awoke to the silence of those around her, gave a

quick start and flashed forward to the door and so out into the street

before Mr. Orcutt could rouse himself sufficiently from the stupor of

the moment to follow her.

III.

THE UNFINISHED LETTER.

Faith, thou hast some crotchets in thy head now.

--MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR.

"WOULD there be any indiscretion in my asking who that young lady is?"

inquired Mr. Byrd of Mr. Ferris, as, after ascertaining that the

stricken sufferer still breathed, they stood together in a distant

corner of the dining-room.

"No," returned the other, in a low tone, with a glance in the direction

of the lawyer, who was just re-entering the house, after an unsuccessful

effort to rejoin the person of whom they were speaking. "She is a Miss

Dare, a young lady much admired in this town, and believed by many to be

on the verge of matrimony with----" He nodded toward Mr. Orcutt, and

discreetly forbore to finish the sentence.

"Ah!" exclaimed the youthful detective, "I understand." And he cast a

look of suddenly awakened interest at the man who, up to this time, he

had merely regarded as a more than usually acute criminal lawyer.

He saw a small, fair, alert man, of some forty years of age, of a good

carriage, easy manner, and refined cast of countenance, overshadowed now

by a secret anxiety he vainly tried to conceal. He was not as handsome

as Coroner Tredwell, nor as well built as Mr. Ferris, yet he was,

without doubt, the most striking-looking man in the room, and, to the

masculine eyes of the detective, seemed at first glance to be a person

to win the admiration, if not the affection, of women.

"She appears to take a great interest in this affair," he ventured

again, looking back at Mr. Ferris.

"Yes, that is woman's way," replied the other, lightly, without any hint

of secret feeling or curiosity. "Besides, she is an inscrutable girl,

always surprising you by her emotions--or by her lack of them," he

added, dismissing the topic with a wave of his hand.

"Which is also woman's way," remarked Mr. Byrd, retiring into his shell,

from which he had momentarily thrust his head.

"Does it not strike you that there are rather more persons present than

are necessary for the purposes of justice?" asked the lawyer, now coming

forward with a look of rather pointed significance at the youthful

stranger.

Mr. Ferris at once spoke up. "Mr. Orcutt," said he, "let me introduce to

you Mr. Byrd, of New York. He is a member of the police force, and has

been rendering me assistance in the case just adjourned."

"A detective!" repeated the other, eying the young man with a critical

eye. "It is a pity, sir," he finally observed, "that your present duties

will not allow you to render service to justice in this case of

mysterious assault." And with a bow of more kindness than Mr. Byrd had

reason to look for, he went slowly back to his former place near the

door that hid the suffering woman from sight.

However kindly expressed, Mr. Byrd felt that he had received his

dismissal, and was about to withdraw, when the coroner, who had been

absent from their midst for the last few minutes, approached them from

the foot of the stairs, and tapped the detective on the arm.

"I want you," said he.

Mr. Byrd bowed, and with a glance toward the District Attorney, who

returned him a nod of approval, went quickly out with the coroner.

"I hear you are a detective," observed the latter, taking him up stairs

into a room which he carefully locked behind them. "A detective on the

spot in a case like this is valuable; are you willing to assume the

duties of your profession and act for justice in this matter?"

"Dr. Tredwell," returned the young man, instantly conscious of a vague,

inward shrinking from meddling further in the affair, "I am not at

present master of my proceedings. To say nothing of the obedience I owe

my superiors at home, I am just now engaged in assisting Mr. Ferris in

the somewhat pressing matter now before the court, and do not know

whether it would meet with his approval to have me mix up matters in

this way."

"Mr. Ferris is a reasonable man," said the coroner. "If his consent is

all that is necessary----"

"But it is not, sir. I must have orders from New York."

"Oh, as to that, I will telegraph at once."

But still the young man hesitated, lounging in his easy way against the

table by which he had taken his stand.

"Dr. Tredwell," he suggested, "you must have men in this town amply able

to manage such a matter as this. A woman struck in broad daylight and a

man already taken up on suspicion! 'Tis simple, surely; intricate

measures are not wanted here."

"So you still think it is the tramp that struck her?" quoth the coroner,

a trifle baffled by the other's careless manner.

"I still think it was not the man who sat in court all the morning and

held me fascinated by his eye."

"Ah, he held you fascinated, did he?" repeated the other, a trifle

suspiciously.

"Well, that is," Mr. Byrd allowed, with the least perceptible loss of

his easy bearing, "he made me look at him more than once. A wandering

eye always attracts me, and his wandered constantly."

"Humph! and you are sure he was in the court every minute of the

morning?"

"There must be other witnesses who can testify to that," answered the

detective, with the perceptible irritation of one weary of a subject

which he feels he has already amply discussed.

"Well," declared the other, dropping his eyes from the young man's

countenance to a sheet of paper he was holding in his hand, "whatever

_role_ this humpback has played in the tragedy now occupying us, whether

he be a wizard, a secret accomplice, a fool who cannot keep his own

secret, or a traitor who cannot preserve that of his tools, this affair,

as you call it, is not likely to prove the simple matter you seem to

consider it. The victim, if not her townsfolk, knew she possessed an

enemy, and this half-finished letter which I have found on her table,

raises the question whether a common tramp, with no motive but that of

theft or brutal revenge, was the one to meditate the fatal blow, even if

he were the one to deal it."

A perceptible light flickered into the eyes of Mr. Byrd, and he glanced

with a new but unmistakable interest at the letter, though he failed to

put out his hand for it, even though the coroner held it toward him.

"Thank you," said he; "but if I do not take the case, it would be better

for me not to meddle any further with it."

"But you are going to take it," insisted the other, with temper, his

anxiety to secure this man's services increasing with the opposition he

so unaccountably received. "The officers at the detective bureau in New

York are not going to send another man up here when there is already one

on the spot. And a man from New York I am determined to have. A crime

like this shall not go unpunished in this town, whatever it may do in a

great city like yours. We don't have so many murder cases that we need

to stint ourselves in the luxury of professional assistance."

"But," protested the young man, still determined to hold back, whatever

arguments might be employed or inducements offered him, "how do you know

I am the man for your work? We have many sorts and kinds of detectives

in our bureau. Some for one kind of business, some for another; the

following up of a criminal is not mine."

"What, then, is yours?" asked the coroner, not yielding a jot of his

determination.

The detective was silent.

"Read the letter," persisted Dr. Tredwell, shrewdly conscious that if

once the young man's professional instinct was aroused, all the puerile

objections which influenced him would immediately vanish.

There was no resisting that air of command. Taking the letter in his

hand, the young man read:

"DEAR EMILY:--I don't know why I sit down to write

to you to-day. I have plenty to do, and morning is

no time for indulging in sentimentalities; but I

feel strangely lonely and strangely anxious.

Nothing goes just to my mind, and somehow the many

causes for secret fear which I have always had,

assume an undue prominence in my mind. It is

always so when I am not quite well. In vain I

reason with myself, saying that respectable people

do not lightly enter into crime. But there are so

many to whom my death would be more than welcome,

that I constantly see myself in the act of

being----"

"Struck, shot, murdered," suggested Dr. Tredwell, perceiving the young

man's eye lingering over the broken sentence.

"The words are not there," remonstrated Mr. Byrd; but the tone of his

voice showed that his professional complacency had been disturbed at

last.

The other did not answer, but waited with the wisdom of the trapper who

sees the quarry nosing round the toils.

"There is evidently some family mystery," the young man continued,

glancing again at the letter. "But," he remarked, "Mr. Orcutt is a good

friend of hers, and can probably tell us what it all means."

"Very likely," the other admitted, "if we choose to ask him."

Quick as lightning the young man's glance flashed to the coroner's face.

"You would rather not put the question to him?" he inquired.

"No. As he is the lawyer who, in all probability, will be employed by

the criminal in this case, I am sure he would rather not be mixed up in

any preliminary investigation of the affair."

The young man's eye did not waver. He appeared to take a secret resolve.

"Has it not struck you," he insinuated, "that Mr. Orcutt might have

other reasons for not wishing to give any expression of opinion in

regard to it?"

The surprise in the coroner's eye was his best answer.

"No," he rejoined.

Mr. Byrd at once resumed all his old nonchalance.

"The young lady who was here appeared to show such agitated interest in

this horrible crime, I thought that, in kindness to her, he might wish

to keep out of the affair as much as possible."

"Miss Dare? Bless your heart, she would not restrict him in any way. Her

interest in the matter is purely one of curiosity. It has been carried,

perhaps, to a somewhat unusual length for a woman of her position and

breeding. But that is all, I assure you. Miss Dare's eccentricities are

well known in this town."

"Then the diamond ring was really hers?" Mr. Byrd was about to inquire,

but stopped; something in his memory of this beautiful woman made it

impossible for him to disturb the confidence of the coroner in her

behalf, at least while his own doubts were so vague and shadowy.

The coroner, however, observed the young detective's hesitation, and

smiled.

"Are you thinking of Miss Dare as having any thing to do with this

shocking affair?" he asked.

Mr. Byrd shook his head, but could not hide the flush that stole up over

his forehead.

The coroner actually laughed, a low, soft, decorous laugh, but none the

less one of decided amusement. "Your line is not in the direction of

spotting criminals, I must allow," said he. "Why, Miss Dare is not only

as irreproachable a young lady as we have in this town, but she is a

perfect stranger to this woman and all her concerns. I doubt if she even

knew her name till to-day."

A laugh is often more potent than argument. The face of the detective

lighted up, and he looked very manly and very handsome as he returned

the letter to the coroner, saying, with a sweep of his hand as if he

tossed an unworthy doubt away forever:

"Well, I do not wish to appear obstinate. If this woman dies, and the

inquest fails to reveal who her assailant is, I will apply to New York

for leave to work up the case; that is, if you continue to desire my

assistance. Meanwhile----"

"You will keep your eyes open," intimated the coroner, taking back the

letter and putting it carefully away in his breast-pocket. "And now,

mum!"

Mr. Byrd bowed, and they went together down the stairs.

It was by this time made certain that the dying woman was destined to

linger on for some hours. She was completely unconscious, and her breath

barely lifted the clothes that lay over the slowly laboring breast; but

such vitality as there was held its own with scarcely perceptible

change, and the doctor thought it might be midnight before the solemn

struggle would end. "In the meantime, expect nothing," he exclaimed;

"she has said her last word. What remains will be a mere sinking into

the eternal sleep."

This being so, Mr. Orcutt and Mr. Ferris decided to leave. Mr. Byrd saw

them safely out, and proceeded to take one or two private observations

of his own. They consisted mostly in noting the precise position of the

various doors in reference to the hearth where the stick was picked up,

and the clock where the victim was attacked. Or, so the coroner gathered

from the direction which Mr. Byrd's eye took in its travels over the

scene of action, and the diagram which he hastily drew on the back of an

envelope. The table was noticed, too, and an inventory of its articles

taken, after which he opened the side-door and looked carefully out into

the lane.

To observe him now with his quick eye flashing from spot to spot, his

head lifted, and a visible air of determination infused through his

whole bearing, you would scarcely recognize the easy, gracefully

indolent youth who, but a little while before, lounged against the

tables and chairs, and met the most penetrating eye with the sleepy gaze

of a totally uninterested man. Dr. Tredwell, alert to the change, tapped

the letter in his pocket complacently. "I have roused up a weasel," he

mentally decided, and congratulated himself accordingly.

It was two o'clock when Mr. Byrd went forth to join Mr. Ferris in the

court-room. As he stepped from the door, he encountered, to all

appearance, just the same crowd that had encumbered its entrance a half

hour before. Even the old crone had not moved from her former position,

and seeing him, fairly pounced upon him with question after question,

all of which he parried with a nonchalant dexterity that drew shout

after shout from those who stood by, and, finally, as he thought, won

him the victory, for, with an angry shake of the head, she ceased her

importunities, and presently let him pass. He hastened to improve the

chance to gain for himself the refuge of the streets; and, having done

this, stood for an instant parleying with a trembling young girl, whose

real distress and anxiety seemed to merit some attention. Fatal delay.

In that instant the old woman had got in front of him, and when he

arrived at the head of the street he found her there.

"Now," said she, with full-blown triumph in her venomous eyes, "perhaps

you will tell me something! You think I am a mumbling old woman who

don't know what she is bothering herself about. But I tell you I've not

kept my eyes and ears open for seventy-five years in this wicked world

without knowing a bit of the devil's own work when I see it." Here her

face grew quite hideous, and her eyes gleamed with an aspect of gloating

over the evil she alluded to, that quite sickened the young man,

accustomed though he was to the worst phases of moral depravity. Leaning

forward, she peered inquiringly in his face. "What has _she_ to do with

it?" she suddenly asked, emphasizing the pronoun with an expressive

leer.

"She?" he repeated, starting back.

"Yes, she; the pretty young lady, the pert and haughty Miss Dare, that

had but to speak to make the whole crowd stand back. What had she to do

with it, I say? Something, or she wouldn't be here!"

"I don't know what you are talking about," he replied, conscious of a

strange and unaccountable dismay at thus hearing his own passing doubt

put into words by this vile and repellent being. "Miss Dare is a

stranger. She has nothing to do either with this affair or the poor

woman who has suffered by it. Her interest is purely one of sympathy."

"Hi! and you call yourself a smart one, I dare say." And the old

creature ironically chuckled. "Well, well, well, what fools men are!

They see a pretty face, and blind themselves to what is written on it as

plain as black writing on a white wall. They call it sympathy, and never

stop to ask why she, of all the soft-hearted gals in the town, should be

the only one to burst into that house like an avenging spirit! But it's

all right," she went on, in a bitterly satirical tone. "A crime like

this can't be covered up, however much you may try; and sooner or later

we will all know whether this young lady has had any thing to do with

Mrs. Clemmens' murder or not."

"Stop!" cried Mr. Byrd, struck in spite of himself by the look of

meaning with which she said these last words. "Do you know any thing

against Miss Dare which other folks do not? If you do, speak, and let me

hear at once what it is. But--" he felt very angry, though he could not

for the moment tell why--"if you are only talking to gratify your

spite, and have nothing to tell me except the fact that Miss Dare

appeared shocked and anxious when she came from the widow's house just

now, look out what use you make of her name, or you will get yourself

into trouble. Mr. Orcutt and Mr. Ferris are not men to let you go

babbling round town about a young lady of estimable character." And he

tightened the grip he had taken upon her arm and looked at her

threateningly.

The effect was instantaneous. Slipping from his grasp, she gazed at him

with a sinister expression and edged slowly away.

"I know any thing?" she repeated. "What should I know? I only say the

young lady's face tells a very strange story. If you are too dull or too

obstinate to read it, it's nothing to me." And with another leer and a

quick look up and down the street, as if she half feared to encounter

one or both of the two lawyers whose names he had mentioned, she marched

quickly away, wagging her head and looking back as she went, as much as

to say: "You have hushed me up for this time, young man, but don't

congratulate yourself too much. I have still a tongue in my head, and

the day may come when I can use it without any fear of being stopped by

you."

Mr. Byrd, who was not very well pleased with himself or the way he had

managed this interview, watched her till she was out of sight, and then

turned thoughtfully toward the court-house. The fact was, he felt both

agitated and confused. In the first place, he was disconcerted at

discovering the extent of the impression that had evidently been made

upon him by the beauty of Miss Dare, since nothing short of a deep,

unconscious admiration for her personal attributes, and a strong and

secret dread of having his lately acquired confidence in her again

disturbed, could have led him to treat the insinuations of this babbling

old wretch in such a cavalier manner. Any other detective would have

seized with avidity upon the opportunity of hearing what she had to say

on such a subject, and would not only have cajoled her into confidence,

but encouraged her to talk until she had given utterance to all that was

on her mind. But in the stress of a feeling to which he was not anxious

to give a name, he had forgotten that he was a detective, and remembered

only that he was a man; and the consequence was that he had frightened

the old creature, and cut short words that it was possibly his business

to hear. In the second place, he felt himself in a quandary as regarded

Miss Dare. If, as was more than possible, she was really the innocent

woman the coroner considered her, and the insinuations, if not threats,

to which he had been listening were simply the result of a wicked old

woman's privately nurtured hatred, how could he reconcile it to his duty

as a man, or even as a detective, to let the day pass without warning

her, or the eminent lawyer who honored her with his regard, of the

danger in which she stood from this creature's venomous tongue.

As he sat in court that afternoon, with his eye upon Mr. Orcutt, beneath

whose ordinary aspect of quiet, sarcastic attention he thought he could

detect the secret workings of a deep, personal perplexity, if not of

actual alarm, he asked himself what he would wish done if he were that

man, and a scandal of a debasing character threatened the peace of one

allied to him by the most endearing ties. "Would I wish to be informed

of it?" he queried. "I most certainly should," was his inward reply.

And so it was that, after the adjournment of court, he approached Mr.

Orcutt, and leading him respectfully aside, said, with visible

reluctance:

"I beg your pardon, sir, but a fact has come to my knowledge to-day with

which I think you ought to be made acquainted. It is in reference to the

young lady who was with us at Mrs. Clemmens' house this morning. Did you

know, sir, that she had an enemy in this town?"

Mr. Orcutt, whose thoughts had been very much with that young lady since

she left him so unceremoniously a few hours before, started and looked

at Mr. Byrd with surprise which was not without its element of distrust.

"An enemy?" he repeated. "An enemy? What do you mean?"

"What I say, Mr. Orcutt. As I came out of Mrs. Clemmens' house this

afternoon, an old hag whose name I do not know, but whom you will

probably have no difficulty in recognizing, seized me by the arm and

made me the recipient of insinuations and threats against Miss Dare,

which, however foolish and unfounded, betrayed an animosity and a desire

to injure her that is worthy your attention."

"You are very kind," returned Mr. Orcutt, with increased astonishment

and a visible constraint, "but I do not understand you. What

insinuations or threats could this woman have to make against a young

lady of Miss Dare's position and character?"

"It is difficult for me to tell you," acknowledged Mr. Byrd; "but the

vicious old creature presumed to say that Miss Dare must have had a

special and secret interest in this murder, or she would not have gone

as she did to that house. Of course," pursued the detective, discreetly

dropping his eyes from the lawyer's face, "I did what I could to show

her the folly of her suspicions, and tried to make her see the trouble

she would bring upon herself if she persisted in expressing them; but I

fear I only succeeded in quieting her for the moment, and that she will

soon be attacking others with this foolish story."

Mr. Orcutt who, whatever his own doubts or apprehensions, could not fail

to be totally unprepared for a communication of this kind, gave

utterance to a fierce and bitter exclamation, and fixed upon the

detective his keen and piercing eye.

"Tell me just what she said," he demanded.

"I will try to do so," returned Mr. Byrd. And calling to his aid a very

excellent memory, he gave a _verbatim_ account of the conversation that

had passed between him and the old woman. Mr. Orcutt listened, as he

always did, without interruption or outward demonstration; but when the

recital was over and Mr. Byrd ventured to look at him once more, he

noticed that he was very pale and greatly changed in expression. Being

himself in a position to understand somewhat of the other's emotion, he

regained by an effort the air of polite nonchalance that became him so

well, and quickly suggested: "Miss Dare will, of course, be able to

explain herself."

The lawyer flashed upon him a quick glance.

"I hope you have no doubts on the subject," he said; then, as the

detective's eye fell a trifle before his, paused and looked at him with

the self-possession gained in fifteen years of practice in the criminal

courts, and said: "I am Miss Dare's best friend. I know her well, and

can truly say that not only is her character above reproach, but that I

am acquainted with no circumstances that could in any way connect her

with this crime. Nevertheless, the incidents of the day have been such

as to make it desirable for her to explain herself, and this, as you

say, she will probably have no difficulty in doing. If you will,

therefore, wait till to-morrow before taking any one else into your

confidence, I promise you to see Miss Dare myself, and, from her own

lips, learn the cause of her peculiar interest in this affair.

Meanwhile, let me request you to put a curb upon your imagination, and

not allow it to soar too high into the regions of idle speculation."

And he held out his hand to the detective with a smile whose vain

attempt at unconcern affected Mr. Byrd more than a violent outbreak

would have done. It betrayed so unmistakably that his own secret doubts

were not without an echo in the breast of this eminent lawyer.

IV.

IMOGENE.

You are a riddle, solve you who can.--KNOWLES.

MR. ORCUTT was a man who for many years had turned a deaf ear and a cold

eye to the various attractions and beguilements of woman. Either from

natural coldness of disposition, or for some other latent cause,

traceable, perhaps, to some fact in his past history, and not to be

inquired into by gossiping neighbors and so-called friends, he had

resisted, even to the point of disdain, both the blandishments of

acknowledged belles, and the more timid but no less pleasing charms of

the shy country misses that he met upon his travels.

But one day all this was changed. Imogene Dare entered his home,

awakening a light in the dim old place that melted his heart and made a

man out of what was usually considered a well-ordered machine.

She had been a foundling. Yes, this beautiful, disdainful, almost

commanding woman, had in the beginning been that most unfortunate of

beings--a child without a name. But though this fact may have influenced

the course of her early days, it gradually disappeared from notice as

she grew up and developed, till in Sibley, at least, it became wellnigh

a fact forgotten. Her beauty, as well as the imposing traits of her

character, was the cause. There are some persons so gifted with natural

force that, once brought in contact with them, you forget their

antecedents, and, indeed, every thing but themselves. Either their

beauty overawes you or they, by conversation or bearing, so completely

satisfy you of their right to your respect, that indifference takes the

place of curiosity, and you yield your regard as if you have already

yielded your admiration, without question and without stint.

The early years of her life were passed in the house of a poor widow, to

whom the appearance of this child on her door-step one fine day had been

nothing more nor less than a veritable godsend. First, because she was

herself alone in the world, and needed the mingled companionship and

care which a little one invariably gives; and, secondly, because

Imogene, from the very first, had been a noticeable child, who early

attracted the attention of the neighbors, and led to many a substantial

evidence of favor from them, as well as from the strangers who passed

their gate or frequented their church. Insensibly to herself, and

without help of circumstances or rearing, the girl was a magnet toward

which all good things insensibly tended; and the widow saw this, and,

while reaping the reward, stinted neither her affection nor her

gratitude.

When Imogene was eleven, this protector of her infancy died. But another

home instantly offered. A wealthy couple of much kindness, if little

culture, adopted her as their child, and gave her every benefit in life

save education. This never having possessed themselves, they openly

undervalued. But she was not to be kept down by the force of any

circumstances, whether favorable or otherwise. All the graces of manner

and refinements of thought which properly belong to the station she had

now attained, but which, in the long struggle after wealth, had escaped

the honest couple that befriended her, became by degrees her own,

tempering without destroying her individuality, any more than the new

life of restraint that now governed her physical powers, was able to

weaken or subdue that rare and splendid physique which had been her

fairest birthright.

In the lap of luxury, therefore, and in full possession of means to come

and go and conform herself to the genteel world and its fashions, she

passed the next four years; but scarcely had she attained the age of

fifteen, when bankruptcy, followed by death, again robbed her of her

home and set her once more adrift upon the world.

This time she looked to no one for assistance. Refusing all offers, many

of them those of honorable marriage, she sought for work, and after a

short delay found it in the household of Mr. Orcutt. The aged sister who

governed his home and attended to all its domestic details, hired her as

a sort of assistant, rightly judging that the able young body and the

alert hand would bring into the household economy just that life and

interest which her own failing strength had now for some time refused

to supply.

That the girl was a beauty and something more, who could not from the

nature of things be kept in that subordinate position, she either failed

to see, or, seeing, was pleased to disregard. She never sought to impose

restraint upon the girl any more than she did upon her brother, when in

the course of events she saw that his eye was at last attracted and his

imagination fired by the noble specimen of girlhood that made its daily

appearance at his own board.

That she had introduced a dangerous element into that quiet home, that

ere long would devastate its sacred precincts, and endanger, if not

destroy, its safety and honor, she had no reason to suspect. What was

there in youth, beauty, and womanly power that one should shrink from

their embodiment and tremble as if an evil instead of a good had entered

that hitherto undisturbed household? Nothing, if they had been all. But

alas for her, and alas for him--they were not all! Mixed with the youth,

beauty, and power was a something else not to be so readily

understood--a something, too, which, without offering explanation to the

fascinated mind that studied her, made the beauty unique, the youth a

charm, and the power a controlling force. She was not to be sounded.

Going and coming, smiling and frowning, in movement or at rest, she was

always a mystery; the depths of her being remaining still in hiding,

however calmly she spoke or however graciously she turned upon you the

light of her deep gray eyes.

Mr. Orcutt loved her. From the first vision he had of her face and form

dominating according to their nature at his board and fireside, he had

given up his will into her unconscious keeping. She was so precisely

what all other women he had known were not. At first so distant, so

self-contained, so unapproachable in her pride; then as her passion grew

for books, so teachable, so industrious, so willing to listen to his

explanations and arguments; and lastly----

But that did not come at once. A long struggle took place between those

hours when he used to encourage her to come into his study and sit at

his side, and read from his books, and the more dangerous time still,

when he followed her into the drawing-room and sat at her side, and

sought to read, not from books, but from her eyes, the story of his own

future fate.

For, powerful as was his passion and deeply as his heart had been

touched, he did not yield to the thought of marriage which such a

passion involves, without a conflict. He would make her his child, the

heiress of his wealth, and the support of his old age; this was his

first resolve. But it did not last; the first sight he had of her on her

return from a visit to Buffalo, which he had insisted upon her making

during the time of his greatest mental conflict, had assured him that

this could never be; that he must be husband and she wife, or else

their relations must entirely cease. Perhaps the look with which she

met him had something to do with this. It was such a blushing,

humble--yes, for her, really humble and beautiful--look. He could not

withstand it. Though no one could have detected it in his manner, he

really succumbed in that hour. Doubt and hesitation flew to the winds,

and to make her his own became the sole aim and object of his life.

He did not, however, betray his purpose at once. Neighbors and friends

might and did suspect the state of his feelings, but to her he was

silent. That vague something which marked her off from the rest of her

sex, seemed to have deepened in her temporary sojourn from his side, and

whatever it meant of good or of ill, it taught him at least to be wary.

At last, was it with premeditation or was it in some moment of

uncontrollable impulse, he spoke; not with definite pleading, or even

with any very clear intimation that he desired some day to make her his

wife, but in a way that sufficed to tear the veil from their previous

intercourse and let her catch a glimpse, if no more, of his heart, and

its devouring passion.

He was absolutely startled at the result. She avowed that she had never

thought of his possessing such a regard for her; and for two days shut

herself up in her room and refused to see either him or his sister. Then

she came down, blooming like a rose, but more distant, more quiet, and

more inscrutable than ever. Pride, if pride she felt, was subdued under

a general aspect of womanly dignity that for a time held all further

avowals in check, and made all intercourse between them at once potent

in its attraction and painful in its restraint.

"She is waiting for a distinct offer of marriage," he decided.

And thus matters stood, notwithstanding the general opinion of their

friends, when the terrible event recorded in the foregoing chapters of

this story brought her in a new light before his eyes, and raised a

question, shocking as it was unexpected, as to whether this young girl,

immured as he had believed her to be in his own home, had by some

unknown and inexplicable means run upon the secret involving, if not

explaining, the mystery of this dreadful and daring crime.

Such an idea was certainly a preposterous one to entertain. He neither

could nor would believe she knew more of this matter than any other

disinterested person in town, and yet there had certainly been something

in her bearing upon the scene of tragedy, that suggested a personal

interest in the affair; nor could he deny that he himself had been

struck by the incongruity of her behavior long before it attracted the

attention of others.

But then he had opportunities for judging of her conduct which others

did not have. He not only had every reason to believe that the ring to

which she had so publicly laid claim was not her own, but he had

observed how, at the moment the dying woman had made that tell-tale

exclamation of "_Ring_ and _Hand!_" Miss Dare had looked down at the

jewel she had thus appropriated, with a quick horror and alarm that

seemed to denote she had some knowledge of its owner, or some suspicion,

at least, as to whose hand had worn it before she placed it upon her

own.

It was not, therefore, a matter of wonder that he was visibly affected

at finding her conduct had attracted the attention of others, and one of

those a detective, or that the walk home after his interview with Mr.

Byrd should have been fraught with a dread to which he scarcely dared to

give a name.

The sight of Miss Dare coming down the path as he reached his own gate

did not tend to greatly allay his apprehensions, particularly as he

observed she was dressed in travelling costume, and carried a small

satchel on her arm.

"Imogene," he cried, as she reached him, "what is the meaning of this?

Where are you going?"

Her face, which wore a wholly unnatural and strained expression, turned

slowly toward his.

"I am going to Buffalo," she said.

"To Buffalo?"

"Yes."

This was alarming, surely. She was going to leave the town--leave it

suddenly, without excuse or explanation!

Looking at her with eyes which, for all their intense inquiry, conveyed

but little of the serious emotions that were agitating his mind, he

asked, hurriedly:

"What takes you to Buffalo--to-day--so suddenly?"

Her answer was set and mechanical.

"I have had news. One of my--my friends is not well. I must go. Do not

detain me."

And she moved quickly toward the gate.

But his tremulous hand was upon it, and he made no offer to open a

passage for her.

"Pardon me," said he, "but I cannot let you go till I have had some

conversation with you. Come with me to the house, Imogene. I will not

detain you long."

But with a sad and abstracted gesture she slowly shook her head.

"It is too late," she murmured. "I shall miss the train if I stop now."

"Then you must miss it," he cried, bitterly, forgetting every thing else

in the torture of his uncertainty. "What I have to say cannot wait.

Come!"

This tone of command from one who had hitherto adapted himself to her

every whim, seemed to strike her. Paling quickly, she for the first time

looked at him with something like a comprehension of his feelings, and

quietly replied:

"Forgive me. I had forgotten for the moment the extent of your claims

upon me. I will wait till to-morrow before going." And she led the way

back to the house.

When they were alone together in the library, he turned toward her with

a look whose severity was the fruit of his condition of mind rather than

of any natural harshness or imperiousness.

"Now, Imogene," said he, "tell me why you desire to leave my house."

Her face, which had assumed a mask of cold impassiveness, confronted him

like that of a statue, but her voice, when she spoke, was sufficiently

gentle.

"Mr. Orcutt," was her answer, "I have told you. I have a call elsewhere

which must be attended to. I do not leave your house; I merely go to

Buffalo for a few days."

But he could not believe this short statement of her intentions. In the

light of these new fears of his, this talk of Buffalo, and a call there,

looked to him like the merest subterfuge. Yet her gentle tone was not

without its effect, and his voice visibly softened as he said:

"You are intending, then, to return?"

Her reply was prefaced by a glance of amazement.

"Of course," she responded at last. "Is not this my home?"

Something in the way she said this carried a ray of hope to his heart.

Taking her hand in his, he looked at her long and searchingly.

"Imogene!" he exclaimed, "there is something serious weighing upon your

heart. What is it? Will you not make me the confidant of your troubles?

Tell me what has made such a change in you since--since noon, and its

dreadful event."

But her expression did not soften, and her manner became even more

reserved than before.

[Illustration: "Taking her hand in his, he looked at her long and

searchingly. 'Imogene,' he exclaimed, 'there is something weighing on

your heart.'"--(Page 58.)]

"I have not any thing to tell," said she.

"Not any thing?" he repeated.

"Not any thing."

Dropping her hand, he communed a moment with himself. That a secret of

possible consequence lay between them he could not doubt. That it had

reference to and involved the crime of the morning, he was equally sure.

But how was he to make her acknowledge it? How was he to reach her mind

and determine its secrets without alarming her dignity or wounding her

heart?

To press her with questions seemed impossible. Even if he could have

found words with which to formulate his fears, her firm, set face, and

steady, unrelenting eye, assured him only too plainly that the attempt

would be met by failure, if it did not bring upon him her scorn and

contempt. No; some other method must be found; some way that would

completely and at once ease his mind of a terrible weight, and yet

involve no risk to the love that had now become the greatest necessity

of his existence. But what way? With all his acumen and knowledge of the

world, he could think of but one. He would ask her hand in

marriage--aye, at this very moment--and from the tenor of her reply

judge of the nature of her thoughts. For, looking in her face, he felt

forced to acknowledge that whatever doubts he had ever cherished in

reference to the character of this remarkable girl, upon one point he

was perfectly clear, and this was, that she was at basis honorable in

her instincts, and would never do herself or another a real injustice.

If a distinct wrong or even a secret of an unhappy or debasing nature

lay between them, he knew that nothing, not even the bitterest necessity

or the most headlong passion, would ever drive her into committing the

dishonor of marrying him.

No; if with his declaration in her ears, and with his eyes fixed upon

hers, she should give any token of her willingness to accept his

addresses, he felt he might know, beyond doubt or cavil, that whatever

womanish excitability may have moved her in her demonstrations that day,

they certainly arose from no private knowledge or suspicion detrimental

to his future peace or to hers.

Bracing himself, therefore, to meet any result that might follow his

attempt, he drew her gently toward him and determinedly addressed her.

"Imogene, I told you at the gate that I had something to say to you. So

I have; and though it may not be wholly unexpected to you, yet I doubt

if it would have left my lips to-night if the events of the day had not

urged me to offer you my sympathy and protection."

He paused, almost sickened; at that last phrase she had grown so

terribly white and breathless. But something in her manner,

notwithstanding, seemed to encourage him to proceed, and smothering his

doubts, trampling, as it were, upon his rising apprehensions, he calmed

down his tone and went quietly on:

"Imogene, I love you."

She did not shrink.

"Imogene, I want you for my wife. Will you listen to my prayer, and make

my home forever happy with your presence?"

Ah, now she showed feeling; now she started and drew back, putting out

her hands as if the idea he had advanced was insupportable to her. But

it was only for a moment. Before he could say to himself that it was all

over, that his worst fears had been true, and that nothing but the sense

of some impassable gulf between them could have made her recoil from him

like this, she had dropped her hands and turned toward him with a look

whose deep inquiry and evident struggle after an understanding of his

claims, spoke of a mind clouded by trouble, but not alienated from

himself by fear.

She did not speak, however,--not for some few minutes, and when she did,

her words came in short and hurried gasps.

"You are kind," was what she said. "To be your--wife"--she had

difficulty in uttering the word, but it came at last--"would be an honor

and a protection. I appreciate both. But I am in no mood to-night to

listen to words of love from any man. Perhaps six months hence----"

But he already had her in his arms. The joy and relief he felt were so

great he could not control himself. "Imogene," he murmured, "my

Imogene!" And scarcely heeded her when, in a burst of subdued agony,

she asked to be released, saying that she was ill and tired, and must be

allowed to withdraw to her room.

But a second appeal woke him from his dream. If his worst fears were

without foundation; if her mind was pure of aught that unfitted her to

be his wife, there was yet much that was mysterious in her conduct, and,

consequently, much which he longed to have explained.

"Imogene," he said, "I must ask you to remain a moment longer. Hard as

it is for me to distress you, there is a question which I feel it

necessary to put to you before you go. It is in reference to the fearful

crime which took place to-day. Why did you take such an interest in it,

and why has it had such an effect upon you that you look like a changed

woman to-night?"

Disengaging herself from his arms, she looked at him with the set

composure of one driven to bay, and asked:

"Is there any thing strange in my being interested in a murder

perpetrated on a person whose name I have frequently heard mentioned in

this house?"

"No," he murmured, "no; but what led you to her home? It was not a spot

for a young lady to be in, and any other woman would have shrunk from so

immediate a contact with crime."

Imogene's hand was on the door, but she turned back.

"I am not like other women," she declared. "When I hear of any thing

strange or mysterious, I want to understand it. I did not stop to ask

what people would think of my conduct."

"But your grief and terror, Imogene? They are real, and not to be

disguised. Look in the glass over there, and you will yourself see what

an effect all this has had upon you. If Mrs. Clemmens is a stranger to

you; if you know no more of her than you have always led me to suppose,

why should you have been so unnaturally impressed by to-day's tragedy?"

It was a searching question, and her eye fell slightly, but her steady

demeanor did not fail her.

"Still," said she, "because I am not like other women. I cannot forget

such horrors in a moment." And she advanced again to the door, upon

which she laid her hand.

Unconsciously his eye followed the movement, and rested somewhat

inquiringly upon that hand. It was gloved, but to all appearance was

without the ring which he had seen her put on at the widow's house.

She seemed to comprehend his look. Meeting his eye with unshaken

firmness, she resumed, in a low and constrained voice:

"You are wondering about the ring that formed a portion of the scene we

are discussing. Mr. Orcutt, I told the gentleman who handed it to me

to-day that it was mine. That should be enough for the man who professes

sufficient confidence in me to wish to make me his wife. But since your

looks confess a curiosity in regard to this diamond, I will say that I

was as much astonished as anybody to see it picked up from the floor at

my feet. The last time I had seen it was when I dropped it, somewhat

recklessly, into a pocket. How or when it fell out, I cannot say. As for

the ring itself," she haughtily added, "young ladies frequently possess

articles of whose existence their friends are unconscious."

Here was an attempt at an explanation which, though meagre and far from

satisfactory, had at least a basis in possibility. But Mr. Orcutt, as I

have before said, was certain that the ring was lying on the floor of

the room where it was picked up, before Imogene had made her appearance

there, and was therefore struck with dismay at this conclusive evidence

of her falsehood.

Yet, as he said to himself, she might have some association with the

ring, might even have an owner's claim upon it, incredible as this

appeared, without being in the possession of such knowledge as

definitely connected it with this crime. And led by this hope he laid

his hand on hers as it was softly turning the knob of the door, and

said, with emotion:

"Imogene, one moment. This is a subject which I am as anxious to drop as

you are. In your condition it is almost cruelty to urge it upon you, but

of one thing I must be assured before you leave my presence, and that

is, that whatever secrets you may hide in your soul, or whatever motive

may have governed your treatment of me and my suit to-night, they do not

spring from any real or supposed interest in this crime, which ought

from its nature to separate you and me. I ask," he quickly added, as he

saw her give a start of injured pride or irrepressible dismay, "not

because I have any doubts on the subject myself, but because some of the

persons who have unfortunately been witness to your strange and excited

conduct to-day, have presumed to hint that nothing short of a secret

knowledge of the crime or criminal could explain your action upon the

scene of tragedy."

And with a look which, if she had observed it, might have roused her to

a sense of the critical position in which she stood, he paused and held

his breath for her reply.

It did not come.

"Imogene?"

"I hear."

Cold and hard the words sounded--his hand went like lightning to his

heart.

"Are you going to answer?" he asked, at last.

"Yes."

"What is that answer to be, Yes or No?"

She turned upon him her large gray eyes. There was misery in their

depths, but there was a haughtiness, also, which only truth could

impart.

"My answer is No!" said she.

And, without another word, she glided from the room.

Next morning, Mr. Byrd found three notes awaiting his perusal. The first

was a notification from the coroner to the effect that the Widow

Clemmens had quietly breathed her last at midnight. The second, a

hurried line from Mr. Ferris, advising him to make use of the day in

concluding a certain matter of theirs in the next town; and the third, a

letter from Mr. Orcutt, couched in the following terms:

MR. BYRD: _Dear Sir_--I have seen the person named

between us, and I here state, upon my honor, that

she is in possession of no facts which it concerns

the authorities to know.

TREMONT B. ORCUTT.

V.

HORACE BYRD.

But now, I am cabin'd, cribbed, confin'd, bound in

To saucy doubts and fears.--MACBETH.

HORACE BYRD was by birth and education a gentleman. He was the son of a

man of small means but great expectations, and had been reared to look

forward to the day when he should be the possessor of a large income.

But his father dying, both means and expectations vanished into thin

air, and at the age of twenty, young Horace found himself thrown upon

the world without income, without business, and, what was still worse,

without those habits of industry that serve a man in such an emergency

better than friends and often better than money itself.

He had also an invalid mother to look after, and two young sisters whom

he loved with warm and devoted affection; and though by the kindness and

forethought of certain relatives he was for a time spared all anxiety on

their account, he soon found that some exertion on his part would be

necessary to their continued subsistence, and accordingly set about the

task of finding suitable employment, with much spirit and no little

hope.

But a long series of disappointments taught him that young men cannot

leap at a bound into a fine salary or even a promising situation; and

baffled in every wish, worn out with continued failures, he sank from

one state of hope to another, till he was ready to embrace any prospect

that would insure ease and comfort to the helpless beings he so much

loved.

It was while he was in this condition that Mr. Gryce--a somewhat famous

police detective of New York--came upon him, and observing, as he

thought, some signs of natural aptitude for _fine work_, as he called

it, in this elegant but decidedly hard-pushed young gentleman, seized

upon him with an avidity that can only be explained by this detective's

long-cherished desire to ally to himself a man of real refinement and

breeding; having, as he privately admitted more than once to certain

chosen friends, a strong need of such a person to assist him in certain

cases where great houses were to be entered and fine gentlemen if not

fair ladies subjected to interviews of a delicate and searching nature.

To join the police force and be a detective was the last contingency

that had occurred to Horace Byrd. But men in decidedly straitened

circumstances cannot pick and choose too nicely; and after a week of

uncertainty and fresh disappointment, he went manfully to his mother and

told her of the offer that had been made him. Meeting with less

discouragement than he had expected from the broken-down and unhappy

woman, he gave himself up to the guiding hand of Mr. Gryce, and before

he realized it, was enrolled among the secret members of the New York

force.

He was not recognized publicly as a detective. His name was not even

known to any but the highest officials. He was employed for special

purposes, and it was not considered desirable that he should be seen at

police head-quarters. But being a man of much ability and of a solid,

reliable nature, he made his way notwithstanding, and by the time he had

been in the service a year, was looked upon as a good-fellow and a truly

valuable acquisition to the bureau. Indeed, he possessed more than the

usual qualifications for his calling, strange as the fact appeared not

only to himself but to the few friends acquainted with his secret. In

the first place, he possessed much acuteness without betraying it. Of an

easy bearing and a polished address, he was a man to please all and

alarm none, yet he always knew what he was about and what you were

about, too, unless indeed you possessed a power of dissimulation much

beyond ordinary, when the chances were that his gentlemanly instincts

would get in his way, making it impossible for him to believe in a guilt

that was too hardy to betray itself, and too insensible to shame to

blush before the touch of the inquisitor.

In the second place, he liked the business. Yes, notwithstanding the

theories of that social code to which he once paid deference,

notwithstanding the frankness and candor of his own disposition, he

found in this pursuit a nice adjustment of cause to effect and effect

to cause that at once pleased and satisfied his naturally mathematical

mind.

He did not acknowledge the fact, not even to himself. On the contrary,

he was always threatening that in another month he should look up some

new means of livelihood, but the coming month would invariably bring a

fresh case before his notice, and then it would be: "Well, after this

matter is probed to the bottom," or, "When that criminal is made to

confess his guilt," till even his little sisters caught the infection,

and would whisper over their dolls:

"Brother Horace is going to be a great man when all the bad and naughty

people in the world are put in prison."

As a rule, Mr. Byrd was not sent out of town. But, on the occasion of

Mr. Ferris desiring a man of singular discretion to assist him in

certain inquiries connected with the case then on trial in Sibley, there

happened to be a deficiency of capable men in the bureau, and the

superintendent was obliged to respond to the call by sending Mr. Byrd.

He did not do it, however, without making the proviso that all public

recognition of this officer, in his real capacity, was to be avoided.

And so far the wishes of his superiors had been respected. No one

outside of the few persons mentioned in the first chapter of this story

suspected that the easy, affable, and somewhat distinguished-looking

young gentleman who honored the village hotel with his patronage was a

secret emissary of the New York police.

Mr. Byrd was, of all men, then, the very one to feel the utmost

attraction toward, and at the same time the greatest shrinking from, the

pursuit of such investigations as were likely to ensue upon the

discovery of the mysterious case of murder which had so unexpectedly

been presented to his notice. As a professional, he could not fail to

experience that quick start of the blood which always follows the

recognition of a "big affair," while as a gentleman, he felt himself

recoil from probing into a matter that was blackened by a possibility

against which every instinct in his nature rebelled.

It was, therefore, with oddly mingled sensations that he read Mr.

Orcutt's letter, and found himself compelled to admit that the coroner

had possessed a truer insight than himself into the true cause of Miss

Dare's eccentric conduct upon the scene of the tragedy. His main

feeling, however, was one of relief. It was such a comfort to think he

could proceed in the case without the dread of stumbling upon a clue

that, in some secret and unforeseen way, should connect this imposing

woman with a revolting crime. Or so he fondly considered. But he had not

spent five minutes at the railroad station, where, in pursuance to the

commands of Mr. Ferris, he went to take the train for Monteith, before

he saw reason to again change his mind. For, there among the passengers

awaiting the New York express, he saw Miss Dare, with a travelling-bag

upon her arm and a look on her face that, to say the least, was of most

uncommon character in a scene of so much bustle and hurry. She was

going away, then--going to leave Sibley and its mystery behind her! He

was not pleased with the discovery. This sudden departure looked too

much like escape, and gave him, notwithstanding the assurance he had

received from Mr. Orcutt, an uneasy sense of having tampered with his

duty as an officer of justice, in thus providing this mysterious young

woman with a warning that could lead to a result like this.

Yet, as he stood at the depot surveying Miss Dare, in the few minutes

they both had to wait, he asked himself over and over again how any

thought of her possessing a personal interest in the crime which had

just taken place could retain a harbor in his mind. She looked so noble

in her quiet aspect of solemn determination, so superior in her young,

fresh beauty--a determination that, from the lofty look it imparted,

must have its birth in generous emotion, even if her beauty was but the

result of a rarely modelled frame and a health of surpassing perfection.

He resolved he would think of her no more in that or any other

connection; that he would follow the example of her best friend, and

give his doubts to the wind.

And yet such a burr is suspicion, that he no sooner saw a young man

approaching her with the evident intention of speaking, than he felt an

irresistible desire to hear what she would have to say, and, led by this

impulse, allowed himself to saunter nearer and nearer the pair, till he

stood almost at their backs.

The first words he heard were:

"How long do you expect to remain in Buffalo, Miss Dare?"

To which she replied:

"I have no idea whether I shall stay a week or a month."

Then the whistle of the advancing train was heard, and the two pressed

hurriedly forward.

The business which had taken Mr. Byrd to Monteith kept him in that small

town all day. But though he thus missed the opportunity of attending the

opening of the inquest at Sibley, he did not experience the vivid

disappointment which might have been expected, his interest in that

matter having in some unaccountable way subsided from the moment he saw

Imogene Dare take the cars for Buffalo.

It was five o'clock when he again returned to Sibley, the hour at which

the western train was also due. In fact, it came steaming in while he

stood there, and, as was natural, perhaps, he paused a moment to watch

the passengers alight. There were not many, and he was about to turn

toward home, when he saw a lady step upon the platform whose appearance

was so familiar that he stopped, disbelieving the evidence of his own

senses. Miss Dare returned? Miss Dare, who but a few hours before had

left this very depot for the purpose, as she said, of making a visit of

more or less length in the distant city of Buffalo? It could not be. And

yet there was no mistaking her, disguised though she was by the heavy

veil that covered her features. She had come back, and the interest

which Mr. Byrd had lost in Sibley and its possible mystery, revived with

a suddenness that called up a self-conscious blush to his hardy cheek.

But why had she so changed her plans? What could have occurred during

the few hours that had elapsed since her departure, to turn her about on

her path and drive her homeward before her journey was half completed?

He could not imagine. True, it was not his present business to do so;

and yet, however much he endeavored to think of other things, he found

this question occupying his whole mind long after his return to the

village hotel. She was such a mystery, this woman, it might easily be

that she had never intended to go to Buffalo; that she had only spoken

of that place as the point of her destination under the stress of her

companion's importunities, and that the real place for which she was

bound had been some spot very much nearer home. The fact, that her

baggage had consisted only of a small bag that she carried on her arm,

would lend probability to this idea, yet, such was the generous

character of the young detective, he hesitated to give credit to this

suspicion, and indeed took every pains to disabuse himself of it by

inquiring of the ticket-agent, whether it was true, as he had heard,

that Miss Dare had left town on that day for a visit to her friends in

Buffalo.

He received for his reply that she had bought a ticket for that place,

though she evidently had not used it, a fact which seemed at least to

prove she was honest in the expression of her intentions that morning,

whatever alteration may have taken place in her plans during the course

of her journey.

Mr. Byrd did not enjoy his supper that night, and was heartily glad

when, in a few moments after its completion, Mr. Ferris came in for a

chat and a cigar.

They had many things to discuss. First, their own case now drawing to a

successful close; next, the murder of the day before; and lastly, the

few facts which had been elicited in regard to that murder, in the

inquiry which had that day been begun before the coroner.

Of the latter Mr. Ferris spoke with much interest. He had attended the

inquest himself, and, though he had not much to communicate--the time

having been mainly taken up in selecting and swearing in a jury--a few

witnesses had been examined and certain conclusions reached, which

certainly added greatly to the impression already made upon the public

mind, that an affair of great importance had arisen; an affair, too,

promising more in the way of mystery than the simple nature of its

earlier manifestations gave them reason to suppose.

In the first place, the widow had evidently been assaulted with a

deliberate purpose and a serious intent to slay.

Secondly, no immediate testimony was forthcoming calculated to point

with unerring certainty to the guilty party.

To be sure, the tramp and the hunchback still offered possibilities of

suspicion; but even they were slight, the former having been seen to

leave the widow's house without entering, and the latter having been

proved beyond a question to have come into town on the morning train and

to have gone at once to court where he remained till the time they all

saw him disappear down the street.

That the last-mentioned individual may have had some guilty knowledge of

the crime was possible enough. The fact of his having wiped himself out

so completely as to elude all search, was suspicious in itself, but if

he was connected with the assault it must have been simply as an

accomplice employed to distract public attention from the real criminal;

and in a case like this, the interest naturally centres with the actual

perpetrator; and the question was now and must be: Who was the man who,

in broad daylight, dared to enter a house situated like this in a

thickly populated street, and kill with a blow an inoffensive woman?

"I cannot imagine," declared Mr. Ferris, as his communication reached

this point. "It looks as if she had an enemy, but what enemy could such

a person as she possess--a woman who always did her own work, attended

to her own affairs, and made it an especial rule of her life never to

meddle with those of anybody else?"

"Was she such a woman?" inquired Mr. Byrd, to whom as yet no knowledge

had come of the widow's life, habits, or character.

"Yes. In all the years I have been in this town I have never heard of

her visiting any one or encouraging any one to visit her. Had it not

been for Mr. Orcutt, she would have lived the life of a recluse. As it

was, she was the most methodical person in her ways that I ever knew. At

just such an hour she rose; at just such an hour put on her kettle,

cooked her meal, washed her dishes, and sat herself down to her sewing

or whatever work it was she had to do. The dinner was the only meal that

waited, and that, Mr. Orcutt says, was always ready and done to a turn

at whatever moment he chose to present himself."

"Had she no intimates, no relatives?" asked Mr. Byrd, remembering that

fragment of a letter he had read--a letter which certainly contradicted

this assertion in regard to her even and quiet life.

"None that I am aware of," was the response. "Wait, I believe I have

been told she has a nephew somewhere--a sister's son, for whom she had

some regard and to whom she intended to leave her money."

"She had money, then?"

"Some five thousand, maybe. Reports differ about such matters."

"And this nephew, where does he live?"

"I cannot tell you. I don't know as any one can. My remembrances in

regard to him are of the vaguest character."

"Five thousand dollars is regarded as no mean sum in a town like this,"

quoth Mr. Byrd, carelessly.

"I know it. She is called quite rich by many. How she got her money no

one knows; for when she first came here she was so poor she had to eat

and sleep all in one room. Mr. Orcutt paid her something for his daily

dinner, of course, but that could not have enabled her to put ten

dollars in the bank as she has done every week for the last ten years.

And to all appearances she has done nothing else for her living. You

see, we have paid attention to her affairs, if she has paid none to

ours."

Mr. Byrd again remembered that scrap of a letter which had been shown

him by the coroner, and thought to himself that their knowledge was in

all probability less than they supposed.

"Who was that horrid crone I saw shouldering herself through the crowd

that collected around the gate yesterday?" was his remark, however. "Do

you remember a wizen, toothless old wretch, whose eye has more of the

Evil One in it than that of many a young thief you see locked up in the

county jails?"

"No; that is, I wonder if you mean Sally Perkins. She is old enough and

ugly enough to answer your description; and, now I think of it, she

_has_ a way of leering at you as you go by that is slightly suggestive

of a somewhat bitter knowledge of the world. What makes you ask about

her?"

"Because she attracted my attention, I suppose. You must remember that I

don't know any of these people, and that an especially vicious-looking

person like her would be apt to awaken my curiosity."

"I see, I see; but, in this case, I doubt if it leads to much. Old Sally

is a hard one, no doubt. But I don't believe she ever contemplated a

murder, much less accomplished it. It would take too much courage, to

say nothing of strength. It was a man's hand struck that blow, Mr.

Byrd."

"Yes," was the quick reply--a reply given somewhat too quickly, perhaps,

for it made Mr. Ferris look up inquiringly at the young man.

"You take considerable interest in the affair," he remarked, shortly.

"Well, I do not wonder. Even my old blood has been somewhat fired by its

peculiar features. I foresee that your detective instinct will soon lead

you to risk a run at the game."

"Ah, then, you see no objection to my trying for the scent, if the

coroner persists in demanding it?" inquired Mr. Byrd, as he followed the

other to the door.

"On the contrary," was the polite response.

And Mr. Byrd found himself satisfied on that score.

Mr. Ferris had no sooner left the room than the coroner came in.

"Well," cried he, with no unnecessary delay, "I want you."

Mr. Byrd rose.

"Have you telegraphed to New York?" he asked.

"Yes, and expect an answer every minute. There will be no difficulty

about that. The superintendent is my friend, and will not be likely to

cross me in my expressed wish."

"But----" essayed the detective.

"We have no time for buts," broke in the coroner. "The inquest begins in

earnest to-morrow, and the one witness we most want has not yet been

found. I mean the man or the woman who can swear to seeing some one

approach or enter the murdered woman's house between the time the

milkman left it at half-past eleven and the hour she was found by Mr.

Orcutt, lying upon the floor of her dining-room in a dying condition.

That such a witness exists I have no doubt. A street in which there are

six houses, every one of which has to be passed by the person entering

Widow Clemmens' gate, must produce one individual, at least, who can

swear to what I want. To be sure, all whom I have questioned so far say

that they were either eating dinner at the time or were in the kitchen

serving it up; but, for all that, there were plenty who saw the tramp,

and two women, at least, who are ready to take their oath that they not

only saw him, but watched him long enough to observe him go around to

the Widow Clemmens' kitchen door and turn about again and come away as

if for some reason he had changed his mind about entering. Now, if there

were two witnesses to see all that, there must have been one somewhere

to notice that other person, known or unknown, who went through the

street but a few minutes before the tramp. At all events, I believe such

a witness can be found, and I mean to have him if I call up every man,

woman, and child who was in the lane at the time. But a little

foreknowledge helps a coroner wonderfully, and if you will aid me by

making judicious inquiries round about, time will be gained, and,

perhaps, a clue obtained that will lead to a direct knowledge of the

perpetrator of this crime."

"But," inquired the detective, willing, at least, to discuss the subject

with the coroner, "is it absolutely necessary that the murderer should

have advanced from the street? Is there no way he could have reached the

house from the back, and so have eluded the gaze of the neighbors round

about?"

"No; that is, there is no regular path there, only a stretch of swampy

ground, any thing but pleasant to travel through. Of course a man with a

deliberate purpose before him might pursue that route and subject

himself to all its inconveniences; but I would scarcely expect it of one

who--who chose such an hour for his assault," the coroner explained,

with a slight stammer of embarrassment that did not escape the

detective's notice. "Nor shall I feel ready to entertain the idea till

it has been proved that no person, with the exception of those already

named, was seen any time during that fatal half-hour to advance by the

usual way to the widow's house."

"Have you questioned the tramp, or in any way received from him an

intimation of the reason why he did not go into the house after he came

to it?"

"He said he heard voices quarrelling."

"Ah!"

"Of course he was not upon his oath, but as the statement was

volunteered, we have some right to credit it, perhaps."

"Did he say"--it was Mr. Byrd now who lost a trifle of his

fluency--"what sort of voices he heard?"

"No; he is an ignorant wretch, and is moreover thoroughly frightened. I

don't believe he would know a cultivated from an uncultivated voice, a

gentleman's from a quarryman's. At all events, we cannot trust to his

discrimination."

Mr. Byrd started. This was the last construction he had expected to be

put upon his question. Flushing a trifle, he looked the coroner

earnestly in the face. But that gentleman was too absorbed in the train

of thought raised by his own remark to notice the look, and Mr. Byrd,

not feeling any too well assured of his own position, forbore to utter

the words that hovered on his tongue.

"I have another commission for you," resumed the coroner, after a

moment. "Here is a name which I wish you would look at----"

But at this instant a smart tap was heard at the door, and a boy entered

with the expected telegram from New York. Dr. Tredwell took it, and,

after glancing at its contents with an annoyed look, folded up the paper

he was about to hand to Mr. Byrd and put it slowly back into his pocket.

He then referred again to the telegram.

"It is not what I expected," he said, shortly, after a moment of

perplexed thought. "It seems that the superintendent is not disposed to

accommodate me." And he tossed over the telegram.

Mr. Byrd took it and read:

"Expect a suitable man by the midnight express. He

will bring a letter."

A flush mounted to the detective's brow.

"You see, sir," he observed, "I was right when I told you I was not the

man."

"I don't know," returned the other, rising. "I have not changed my

opinion. The man they send may be very keen and very well-up in his

business, but I doubt if he will manage this case any better than you

would have done," and he moved quietly toward the door.

"Thank you for your too favorable opinion of my skill," said Mr. Byrd,

as he bowed the other out. "I am sure the superintendent is right. I am

not much accustomed to work for myself, and was none too eager to take

the case in the first place, as you will do me the justice to remember.

I can but feel relieved at this shifting of the responsibility upon

shoulders more fitted to bear it."

Yet, when the coroner was gone, and he sat down alone by himself to

review the matter, he found he was in reality more disappointed than he

cared to confess. Why, he scarcely knew. There was no lessening of the

shrinking he had always felt from the possible developments which an

earnest inquiry into the causes of this crime might educe. Yet, to be

severed in this way from all professional interest in the pursuit cut

him so deeply that, in despite of his usual good-sense and correct

judgment, he was never nearer sending in his resignation than he was in

that short half-hour which followed the departure of Dr. Tredwell. To

distract his thoughts, he at last went down to the bar-room.

VI.

THE SKILL OF AN ARTIST.

A hit, a very palpable hit.--HAMLET.

HE found it occupied by some half-dozen men, one of whom immediately

attracted his attention, by his high-bred air and total absorption in

the paper he was reading. He was evidently a stranger, and, though not

without some faint marks of a tendency to gentlemanly dissipation, was,

to say the least, more than ordinarily good-looking, possessing a large,

manly figure, and a fair, regular-featured face, above which shone a

thick crop of short curly hair of a peculiarly bright blond color. He

was sitting at a small table, drawn somewhat apart from the rest, and

was, as I have said, engrossed with a newspaper, to the utter exclusion

of any apparent interest in the talk that was going on at the other end

of the room. And yet this talk was of the most animated description, and

was seemingly of a nature to attract the attention of the most

indifferent. At all events Mr. Byrd considered it so; and, after one

comprehensive glance at the elegant stranger, that took in not only the

personal characteristics I have noted, but also the frown of deep

thought or anxious care that furrowed a naturally smooth forehead, he

passed quietly up the room and took his stand among the group of

loungers there assembled.

Mr. Byrd was not unknown to the _habitues_ of that place, and no

cessation took place in the conversation. They were discussing an

occurrence slight enough in itself, but made interesting and dramatic by

the unconscious enthusiasm of the chief speaker, a young fellow of

indifferent personal appearance, but with a fervid flow of words and a

knack at presenting a subject that reminded you of the actor's power,

and made you as anxious to watch his gesticulations as to hear the words

that accompanied them.

"I tell you," he was saying, "that it was just a leaf out of a play. I

never saw its equal off the stage. She was so handsome, so impressive in

her trouble or anxiety, or whatever it was that agitated her, and he so

dark, and so determined in _his_ trouble or anxiety, or whatever it was

that agitated him. They came in at different doors, she at one side of

the depot and he at another, and they met just where I could see them

both, directly in the centre of the room. 'You!' was her involuntary

cry, and she threw up her hands before her face just as if she had seen

a ghost or a demon. An equal exclamation burst from him, but he did not

cover his eyes, only stood and looked at her as if he were turned to

stone. In another moment she dropped her hands. 'Were you coming to see

_me_?' came from her lips in a whisper so fraught with secret horror and

anguish that it curdled my blood to hear it. 'Were you coming to see

_me_?' was his response, uttered in an equally suppressed voice and with

an equal intensity of expression. And then, without either giving an

answer to the other's question, they both shrank back, and, turning,

fled with distracted looks, each by the way they had come, the two doors

closing with a simultaneous bang that echoed through that miserable

depot like a knell. There were not many folks in the room just at that

minute, but I tell you those that were looked at each other as they had

not done before and would not be likely to do again. Some unhappy

tragedy underlies such a meeting and parting, gentlemen, and I for one

would rather not inquire what."

"But the girl--the man--didn't you see them again before you left?"

asked an eager voice from the group.

"The young lady," remarked the other, "was on the train that brought me

here. The gentleman went the other way."

"Oh!" "Ah!" and "Where did she get off?" rose in a somewhat deafening

clamor around him.