The Gray Mask

"Jim! What's on your mind? It's a clear case."

"Yes," he answered. "That's why Jones and the other flat-foot your father sent out yesterday didn't search the neighborhood far enough to find the stone building where Randall hid. It's why when I arrested him I didn't look it over either. The arrest at the time seemed enough. But he didn't act like a man caught with the goods. Your father says he's clever. Maybe he is, but I wonder if he is to that extent. It's been the trouble all along. It's too clear a case. I talked to his lawyers this afternoon. He's refused to put in any defence."

"Isn't that proof, Jim, that he knows he hasn't a chance?"

He fumbled, almost unconsciously, with the button-hole in the lapel of his coat.

"It might mean," he answered, "that he was protecting somebody else, and that makes one wonder if there mightn't be something in the house – letters, perhaps, in that bedroom I've never had a chance to explore – something he would like to have destroyed."

"Trust your instinct, Jim."

He arose smiling.

"That's what I've arranged to do."

"Then you're going out there to-night?"

"Yes."

He hesitated, but the temptation was too strong.

"How would you like a taxi-ride to Elmford?"

"Jim, you talk like a millionaire."

"If anything comes of it," he said, "the city will pay. If nothing does I'll look an awful fool, so I'd rather you didn't ask any questions now. But if you want to come – I know you're game."

She laughed and got her hat and coat.

So they drove to the lonely patch of woods near the Elmford gate where Garth instructed the driver to wait for them. He led Nora, warning her not to speak, through the obscurity to the entrance. There he paused, and, after a moment, whistled on a low, prolonged note.

Almost immediately the sound of voices came to them and the scraping of feet in the gravel. Two blacker patches scarcely outlined themselves against the black shrubbery.

"Jones!" Garth called softly.

The men approached.

"All right," Garth said. "Go along home. When did they take Mrs. Randall away?"

"Over an hour ago. Thought you were never coming. Spooky hole!"

"No alarms?" Garth asked.

"No," Jones replied, "but I can hear that woman yelling yet."

Garth laughed, uneasily.

"Well, good-night. There's no secret about your leaving, but don't mention at the station that I'm here."

The men merged into the darkness by the gate.

Garth took Nora's arm, and, circling the house at a distance, reached the stone building by the stream. He entered, sniffing suspiciously. When he had closed the door he took his flashlight from his pocket and pressed the control.

"Don't move around, Nora."

Quickly he examined the confusion of footprints. It impressed him at once as significant that none strayed far from the threshold. The damp floor farther in was disturbed only by a long, irregular depression modelled, he knew, by a body, lying prone.

"Think of lying there, Nora," he said. "I'd have preferred standing indefinitely. And why didn't he move around?"

Nora's teeth chattered.

"It's bitter cold in here."

Garth's face set.

"And a fastidious man like the doctor lies here all night and most of the day. Then let's see."

He went outside and ran his light over the lines of footprints which converged at the door. One set straggled unevenly up the stream. With an exclamation he followed it along the bank until it swung close to the water. He stooped. His lamp moved searchingly about the bottom of the shallow creek. Nora bent over his shoulder.

"Jim! Do you see that stone? There. Hold your light steady. It's been moved. Look at the dark stain on this side."

Garth reached over, rolling the stone away. He drew from the water a stout, slender rope and a black cloth. As he raised the cloth a tiny bottle fell from its folds and splintered on the rock.

Nora's eyes sparkled.

"Does it fit, Jim?"

"It suggests a lot," he answered, "and it explains something, but it's little use unless – "

He caught his breath.

"He might be that kind of a fool."

He sprang upright.

"Come along. We've got to turn up something in the house that will make Randall talk. Nora! If there had been letters do you think she would have destroyed them one by one? You see there was no chance after the murder, and don't women cling to such things?"

"She'd probably keep them," Nora said.

They climbed the hill. The unlighted house, like a thing dead itself and surrendered to decay, arose before them forbiddingly.

"Jones was right," Nora said. "It's spooky."

Garth crossed the verandah on tip-toe and silently opened the door.

"No lights," he breathed.

Nora shivered.

"It's as cold and damp here as the stone house. Can you find your way?"

"Yes. Sh-h."

He led her across the hall, up the staircase, and down the corridor to the dressing-room. The window had been closed in there, and there was no escape for a humid and depressing chill which enveloped them with discomfort.

He found the easy chair and told Nora to sit down. He drew another one close.

"But why not lights, Jim?"

"It's logic to wait awhile," he said. "The letters, you know."

She gasped.

"I begin to see."

"Maybe I shouldn't have brought you," he whispered.

"But who – "

"Sh-h!"

"Did you hear anything?" she asked.

"No. If Randall never wore a rose – "

"Jim! I've never – felt such darkness."

"I must think," he said.

But his brain refused to enter the new country of speculation whose gates the discovery in the stream had opened. The dank air of the room where Treving had been murdered was thick with imminence. A formless anticipation possessed Garth's mind. He had a quick instinct to turn on the lights and proceed with his search, abandoning this course which logic had suggested, but which was fraught, he had no doubt, with positive apprehension to Nora. Why not, indeed, satisfy her curiosity now? But his pride denied the impulse. He wanted first something more tangible, something more provocative of her praise.

"It frightens me here," Nora breathed. "I've the queerest desire to – to scream."

Her laugh was scarcely audible.

Her words had set Garth's memory to work. He knew again what he missed in this silent house – the amorphous screams of a woman in an agony powerless to express itself. How she must have wanted to speak! How horribly she had tried until the supreme, the enduring silence had clutched about her throat! The sullen and sepulchral air of the room seemed to vibrate with the wraiths of those efforts.

Was the door open to the next room where she had struggled and died?

Garth stirred uneasily.

Nora spoke.

"How long?"

"Not long," Garth whispered, "or I'll turn the lights on. I'll look."

His thoughts swung back to the next room and the despair it had harbored. Could such passionate resistance to circumstance perish utterly? Could the violent will behind it accept silence and pass with the body into nothingness?

What had she wanted to say?

A movement, scarcely audible, reached him from the next room.

Nora's hand touched his arm. He was aware of the trembling of her fingers. He leant forward, listening. He scarcely caught Nora's voice.

"You heard – that?"

The movement was repeated – somebody – something stirred in the dark room where the woman had died.

Nora swayed against him. Her other hand touched his shoulder. His heart leapt, but he realized that this contact was only an impersonal appeal for protection. So he drew his arms back, but his brain was clearer. He no longer answered to the fancy that the echoes of those screams tortured his ears.

"Stay here quietly," he whispered.

"Don't go in there, Jim."

He pushed her hands gently away. His movements as he crossed the floor were stealthier than those which still persisted in the bedroom. He paused in the doorway. The darkness was complete, yet he could locate the movements now against the farther wall.

He drew out his revolver and his flashlight. He pressed the button. The glare splintered the blackness and centered on the figure of a man who bent over the open drawer of a desk.

"Throw your hands up!" Garth said.

In the dressing-room Nora cried out.

The man at the desk swung around, lifting his hands and exposing the white and contorted face of the butler, Thompson.

Garth laughed nervously.

"I've got him, Nora."

"Wh – what do you mean?" the man asked. "I came back – Who are you? What do you want of me?"

Garth stepped forward aggressively. His conscience troubled him not at all.

"I want you for the murder of Frederick Treving – there in the next room."

The fellow's jaw dropped.

"No – no. I had nothing to do with it. I swear."

Garth raised his hand to the lapel of the butler's coat.

"I thought so," he said. "No question about you, my man. You wore the rose I found where Treving's body lay. Got it at the wedding, didn't you?"

The man sank on the unmade bed.

"What are you talking about? I had nothing to do with it."

"Tell that to the judge who'll send you to the chair," he said.

The butler shook. He raised his uncertain hands to his face. He shuddered.

"No, no. I tell you I had nothing to do with it. It was Mrs. Randall. He attacked her, and she shot him."

Garth relaxed.

"You heard that, Nora?"

Nora came to the door.

"Yes."

"Then," Garth said, "I am about through with the case."

He turned back to Thompson.

"But you're not clear yet. How did you happen to be here? I know you went to the wedding with the rest."

"Yes, but Mrs. Randall got me on the telephone – said the doctor had been called back to town and she was nervous and I'd have to come home. As I let myself in the back way I heard her scream. I ran up and through this room. I got to the door just in time to see her shoot him. But when I rushed in and tried to lift her up she screamed. I couldn't do anything with her. And I got frightened. When I heard the motorcycle and guessed it was a policeman who had heard her screaming, I ran out the servants' entrance and went back to the wedding and came home with the rest. I was afraid they would take me, and she couldn't say anything to clear me. That's the truth."

Garth looked him over contemptuously.

"And, knowing the truth, you'd have let Dr. Randall go to trial."

Thompson uncovered his face. Through his tears his eyes glowed with an exceptional devotion.

"I worked for her, sir. I had been with her family ever since she was born. Besides, if he didn't want to give her away, what business was it of mine? He sent for me to-day, and when I told him I had seen her shoot him, he made me promise to keep my mouth shut."

"I know he sent for you," Garth said. "That's why I hoped to find you here to-night. He suspected you were a go-between and that there might be letters or something here to incriminate her with Treving."

Thompson nodded.

"I told the doctor, a few letters and trinkets. He said I must get them as soon as the detectives had left and the house was clear. But I can say, sir, there was never anything really out of the way. She wasn't quite happy with the doctor. It would be a kindness to the dead – "

Garth smiled, turning to Nora.

"You wouldn't give me away, would you? All right, Thompson. Do what you came to do."

Thompson shot him a grateful glance and returned to his obliterating task at the desk. Garth snapped on the light.

"But, Jim," Nora asked, "how did you know that man had been a witness? Was it a guess?"

Garth shook his head.

"Simple enough," he said.

He took a short, slender, silvery thread from his pocket. With a shame-faced look he handed it to Nora.

"You'd know more about such things than I. It's a wire that made a broken, worn-out rose look a whole lot better than it was. I found it and the rose in the next room. I recognized it, because, Nora, when I came to dinner the other night I stopped at a sidewalk stand and bought a rose for my button-hole. Silly, wasn't it? But it was a good thing, because I got stung with one of those. That's why I knew what the broken stem and the wire meant. I learned that Randall didn't wear flowers, and I made sure this afternoon what kind of a rose Treving would have worn. Therefore, somebody else had been in that room, wearing a cheap rose which he had almost certainly got at that cheap wedding. When I heard Randall had sent for this man I decided to hold over my subpoenas for the servants until to-morrow, and run out here myself as soon as the detectives were called in – maybe get my man when he wouldn't lie."

Her eyes sparkled.

"And you guessed Randall didn't know about the murder when you caught him?"

"After I had landed him in jail, his manner, taken with the rest of it, worried me. If he wasn't guilty, why had he hidden all night and day? What we found in the stone house answered that, and almost certainly put it up to Mrs. Randall. Of course he guessed she had done it, and that cleared her in his eyes. It's why he's been so sentimental about protecting her memory. He didn't want it stained with murder, and he's probably figured he could tell some story on the stand that would clear her of the scandal, provided Thompson gathered up these little souvenirs of her indiscretion."

"Jim, I'm proud of you," Nora said. "But will Dr. Randall thank you for interfering?"

"I think so, when he's got over this first mistaken idea of what he owes her for protecting his honor and her own even to the point of murder. He'll soon be clear-headed enough to weigh both sides. He'll appreciate then that there isn't much disgrace about such a crime for her, particularly since it's the strongest proof the world could have that Thompson's opinion is right."

He turned to the butler.

"Surely, Thompson, there isn't as much evidence as all that. Come. We ought to get back to town."

As they went down the stairs Garth wondered that his success borrowed its chief value from its effect on Nora. As large as the satisfaction of clearing an innocent and harassed man, loomed the fact that he had, indeed, provoked her praise.

At the turn their hands met in the darkness. He rejoiced that the warmth of her fingers lingered momentarily in his.

CHAPTER VII

NORA FEARS FOR GARTH

From the moment of his solution of the Elmford affair Garth was recognized at headquarters as the man for the big jobs – the city's most serviceable detective. For one who accepted his success so modestly it was difficult to breed jealous enemies. There was, to be sure, some speculation as to how long such a man would chain his abilities by the modest pay of the department, and a wish here and there that he would find it convenient to free himself for broader fields in the near future.

Garth realized that it was the inspector's attitude that had determined his new standing. Under other circumstances things might have progressed more slowly. The tie formed the night of the arrest of Slim and George was still strong.

Garth arranged, when he went to bear the news of his discovery to Dr. Randall in the Tombs, to catch a glimpse of the two. Their greeting sufficiently defined the threat he had always known existed. In their faces he read an intention from which he shrank, more for Nora's sake than for his own. He didn't stay to argue. He walked on to Randall's cell and told the stricken man that in a few minutes he would be free.

Garth had been a good prophet. Randall's first resentment gave way to a gratitude, expressed with difficulty but genuine.

"It – it was exceptionally fine of you to let Thompson destroy those things."

"I would want someone to do as much for me," he answered, "that is, if I ever had the nerve to do what you did. That was the fine thing, doctor."

And Garth went away, aware that he had made a staunch friend.

The inspector was troubled when he heard of Slim and George's open hatred. He saw the district attorney, and others whose ears he had. On his return he sent for Garth.

"The district attorney tells me," he said, "that there isn't a loophole. They'll be convicted and go to the chair as certain as that when the moon shines lovers kiss. If they don't escape. Without suggesting that every crook doesn't get the same attention, I've seen to it that those chair warmers will be watched closer than Fido watches the butcher."

So again Garth put the matter out of his mind, and was aided by an unexpected threat, apparently just as serious, that faced him a very short time after.

On that fall morning he paused on the threshold of the inspector's office, and, surprised and curious, glanced quickly within. It was not so much that Nora sat by the window, clothed in her habitual black, nor was his interest quickened by the fact that she knitted deftly on some heavy, gray garment. Rather his concern centered on the inspector who had left his desk and whose corpulent, lethargic figure moved about the room with an exceptional and eccentric animation.

At Garth's step Nora glanced up, smiling. The inspector retarded his heated walk. To ease the perceptible strain Garth spoke to Nora.

"Seems to me you knit no matter where you are."

"When one knits for the hospitals," she answered, "any place will do. I had hoped my example might quiet father. I only dropped in for a chat, and look at him. What a welcome! I'm afraid, Jim, he has something disagreeable for you."

The inspector paused and sat on the edge of his desk.

"Maybe so. Maybe not," he rumbled. "I don't like working through the dark, so I don't like to ask anybody else to do it. I've got to, though. Cheer up, Garth. I'm asking you."

He raised his paper cutter and jabbed at the desk with a massive petulance.

"Ever since I got down this morning," he went on, "I've been hounded by telegrams and long-distance calls. Well? Do you want a holiday? It's apt to be a hell of a holiday. Excuse me, Nora."

"I see," Garth said. "Something out of town."

The inspector's manner warned him. After long experience he knew it veiled a grave distrust.

"Why," Nora asked, "don't you tell us what the case is?"

The inspector walked around the desk and with a sigh settled himself in his easy chair.

"That's the rumpus," he answered, and Garth saw that his eyes were not quite steady. "Don't know anything about it myself unless they'd like Garth to chase a few spooks. Here's the lay-out. It's a man who's done me a good many favors. There's no secret – political ones. I'm in his debt, and he's asked me for a good detective to go up to his place in New England – not as a detective, mind you, Garth. That's the queer side, the side I don't like. He insists on his man's showing up as a guest, knowing no more than a random guest would know. Sounds like tommy-rot, but he isn't sure himself there's anything out of the way. He wants you, if you take it up, to live quietly in the house, keeping your eyes peeled. He expects you to put him wise to the trouble or to stake your reputation that there isn't any trouble at all. Are you willing to jump into a chase blindly that way? He'd like the fellow that swung the Hennion job, but if you turned it down cold I couldn't help it, could I?"

"Nonsense, chief," Garth answered. "Never heard of such a thing, but it sounds interesting. I'll take a shot at it."

The inspector wrote hurriedly on a piece of paper.

"Here's his name and address. Catch the ten o'clock from the Grand Central and you'll get up there to-night."

Garth took the slip. Before placing it in his pocket he glanced it over.

"Andrew Alden," he saw. "Leave Boston from North Station on four o'clock train and get off at Deacon's Bay."

"I've heard of Mr. – " Garth began.

The inspector's quick, angry shake of the head in Nora's direction brought him to an abrupt pause. He walked to Nora and took her hand.

"Then I won't see you until after my holiday," he said with a smile.

Her eyes were vaguely uneasy.

"I agree with father," she said. "It isn't safe to walk through the dark. Won't you tell me where you're going?"

Garth's laugh was uncomfortable. He didn't pretend to understand, but his course had been clearly enough indicated.

"I'll leave that for the inspector," he answered. "I have to rush to pick up my things on the way to the train."

The uneasiness in her eyes increased.

"You know, Jim, as father says, you can turn it down. It might be wiser."

His heart responded to her anxiety. In view of her fear it was a trifle absurd that their farewell should project nothing more impulsive than a hand-clasp. Its only compensation, indeed, was the reluctance with which she let his fingers go.

When Garth had left, Nora arose and faced her father.

"What's all this mystery?" she demanded. "It's easy enough to guess there's danger for Jim, and you know a lot more than you pretend."

"See here, Nora," the inspector grumbled, "I usually give the third degree myself in this place."

She rested her hands on the desk, studying his uncertain eyes.

"Why," she asked, "wouldn't you let Jim tell me the man's name?"

His bluster was too apparently simulated.

"What did you come down for this morning anyway? No sense in your getting upset. A detective bureau isn't a nursery."

She straightened slowly, her face recording an unwelcome assurance.

"Politics!" she cried. "And Jim's leaving from the Grand Central. I know. He's going to Mr. Alden's at Deacon's Bay. I see why you wouldn't let him tell me."

"Place is all right," the inspector said stubbornly. "You've seen it. You were there with me two summers ago. What's the matter with the place?"

"No use trying to pull the wool over my eyes," Nora answered. "It's the loneliest place I've ever seen, and you ought to know I'd remember Mr. Alden's big furnaces and machine-shop. I read the papers, father. He's staying up so late this year on account of the enormous war orders he's taken. You know as well as I do that that may mean real danger for Jim. What did Mr. Alden tell you?"

The inspector spread his hands helplessly.

"I sometimes think, Nora, you'd make a better detective than any of us. Alden's sick and nervous. I guess that's all it amounts to. He's probably scared some German sympathizer may take a pot shot at him for filling these contracts. And he's worried about his wife. She won't leave him there alone, and it seems all their servants, except old John, have cleared out."

"You said something to Jim about spooks," Nora prompted.

"Thought you'd come to that," the inspector said. "You're like your mother was, Nora – always on the look-out for the supernatural."

"So, I gather, were the servants," she answered drily.

"Silly talk, Alden says, about the woods back of his house. You remember. There was some kind of a fight there during the Revolution – a lot of men ambushed and massacred. I guess you saw the bayonets and gun-locks Alden had dug up. Servants got talking – said they saw things there on foggy nights."

The inspector lowered his voice to a more serious key.

"The angle I don't like is that Alden's valet was found dead in those woods yesterday morning. Not a mark on him. Coroner, I believe, says apoplexy, but Alden's nervous, and the rest of the help cleared out. I suppose they'll get somebody else up as soon as they can. Meantime Alden and his wife are alone with old John. Confound it, Nora, I had to send him somebody."

"But without a word of this!"

"I tell you I don't like it. I didn't want to do it. It was Alden's idea – would have it that way. Frankly I don't make it out, but maybe, being on the spot, he knows best."

"There's something here," she said, "that we can't understand – maybe something big. It isn't fair to Jim."

The inspector looked up slyly.

"Jim," he said, "can take care of himself if anybody can. Seems to me you're pretty anxious. Sure you haven't anything to tell me about you and him? If you had, I might make a place for him watching these ten-cent lunch joints to see that customers didn't carry away the hardware and crockery. Then all the danger you'd have to worry about would be that he might eat the food."

But Nora failed to smile. She glanced away, shaking her head.