The Mystery of the Sycamore

It was clear to all listening, that when Genevieve had whispered to Keefe and he had told her to do her worst, they were now hearing the “worst.”

“So,” Stone narrated, “Mr. Keefe came over here and did the bugling as a preliminary to his further schemes. You admit that, Mr. Keefe?”

“I admit nothing. Tell your silly story as you please.”

“I will. Then, the day of the murder, Mr. Keefe arranged for the fire in the garage. He used the acids as the man Fulton described, and as Keefe’s own coat was burned and his employer’s car he felt sure suspicion would not turn toward him. When the fire broke out – which as it depended on the action of those acids, he was waiting for, Keefe ran with Mr. Allen to the garage. But – and this I have verified from Mr. Allen, Keefe disappeared for a moment, and, later was again at Allen’s side. In that moment – Mr. Wheeler, that psychological moment, Curtis Keefe shot and killed Samuel Appleby.”

“And Mills?”

“Is part of the diabolically clever scheme. Mills was dying; he was leaving a large family without means of support. He depended, and with reason, on hope of your generosity, Mr. Wheeler, to his wife and children. But Curtis Keefe went to him and told him that you were about to be dispossessed of your home and fortune, and that if he would sign the confession – knowing what it was – that he, Keefe, would settle a large sum of money on Mrs. Mills and the children at once. And he did.”

“You fiend! You devil incarnate!” cried Keefe, losing all control. “How do you know that?”

“I found it all out from Mrs. Mills,” Stone replied; “your accomplices all betrayed you, Mr. Keefe. A criminal should beware of accomplices. Rachel turned state’s evidence and told how you bribed her to make up that story of the bugler – or rather, to relate parrot-like – the story you taught to her.”

“It’s all up,” said Keefe, flinging out his hands in despair. “You’ve outwitted me at every point, Mr. Stone. I confess myself vanquished – ”

“And you confess yourself the murderer?” said Stone, quickly.

“I do, but I ask one favor. May I take that paper a moment?”

“Certainly,” said Stone, glancing at the worthless confession.

Keefe stepped to the table desk, where the paper lay, but as he laid his left hand upon it, with his right he quickly pulled open a drawer, grasped the pistol that was in it, and saying, with a slight smile: “A life for a life!” drew the trigger and fell to the floor.

From the gruesome situation, its silence made worse by the noise of the storm outside, Daniel Wheeler led his wife and daughter. Jeffrey Allen followed quickly and sought his loved Maida.

Reaction from the strain made her break down, and sobbing in his arms she asked and received full forgiveness for her enforced desertion of him.

“I couldn’t do anything else, Jeff,” she sobbed. “I had to say yes to him for dad’s sake – and mother’s.”

“Of course you did, darling; don’t think about it. Oh, Maida, look! The wind has torn up the sycamore! Unrooted it, and it has fallen over – ”

“Over into Massachusetts!” Maida cried; “Jeffrey, think what that means!”

“Why – why! – ” Allen was speechless.

“Yes; the sycamore has gone into Massachusetts – and father can go!”

“Is that real, Maida – is it truly a permission?”

“Of course it is! We’ve got Governor Appleby’s letter, saying so – written when he was governor, you know! Jeffrey – I’m so happy! It makes me forget that awful – ”

“Do forget it all you can, dearest,” and beneath her lover’s caresses, Maida did forget, for the moment at least.

“It’s the only inexplicable thing about it all, Fibs,” Fleming Stone observed, after the case was among the annals of the past, “that the old sycamore fell over and fell the right way.”

“Mighty curious, F. Stone,” rejoined the boy, with an expressionless face.

“You didn’t help it along, did you? You know the injunction was, ‘without intervention of human hands.’”

“I didn’t intervent my hands, Mr. Stone,” said the boy, earnestly, “honest I didn’t. But – it wasn’t nominated in the bond that I shouldn’t kick around those old decaying roots with my foot – just so’s if it should take a notion to fall it would fall heading north!”