XXIII
LAWRENCE'S STATEMENT
To my surprise, instead of seeming baffled by my statement, FlemingStone gave me a quizzical glance.
"A perfect alibi?" he repeated. "How do you know?"
"He told me so," I said confidently.
"Why did he tell you that? Did he expect to be accused?"
"No," I replied; "I do not think he did. You know, Mr. Stone, I nevermet young Lawrence till since this affair; but, unless I am no judge ofhuman nature, he is a frank, honest sort of chap, with a whole lot ofcommon sense, and he said to his cousin, in my presence, that in thecourse of legal proceedings he might easily be called upon to give anaccount of his own movements the night of the murder, but that he wasprepared to prove a perfect alibi. Therefore, you see, we cannot suspecthim, notwithstanding the coincidence of the violet-colored glass."
"He can prove a perfect alibi," again repeated Fleming Stone, and againthat strange little gleam of satisfaction crept into his eyes. Itirritated while it fascinated me, and I wondered in what direction hissuspicions would next turn.
"Did he tell you," he asked, "the nature of this alibi?"
I was struck with a sudden thought. For some reason, the detective evenyet suspected George, and all I said seemed to strengthen rather thanallay his suspicion. I would, therefore, give the suspected man a chanceto speak for himself.
"He did," I answered; "but instead of repeating to you at secondhandwhat he told me, would it not be better to go down to his place and lethim tell it for himself?"
"Very much better," said Stone heartily; and again we started downtown.It was well on toward noon, and it seemed to me we had made no definiteprogress. After Fleming Stone had told me he would discover the criminalthat day, I couldn't help imagining a sudden bringing to book of someburly ruffian whose face was well known in the rogues' gallery, butunfamiliar to those in my walk of life. But Stone's sudden interest inGeorge Lawrence filled me with a vague fear that the trail he wasevidently following might somehow implicate Janet before he hadfinished. However, as I was feeling convinced that George's owntestimony would affect Fleming Stone more favorably than my own versionof it, I felt glad indeed that we were bound on our present errand.
And so we came again to the house in Washington Square where Lawrencelived.
The young man was at home, and received us in his studio. He seemed nowhit embarrassed at the detective's visit, greeted me pleasantly, andexpressed himself as quite willing to tell us anything we wanted toknow.
"Of course you understand," began Fleming Stone, "that with so fewpossible witnesses, it is necessary to make a somewhat thoroughexamination of each one."
"Certainly," said George, whose own affability of manner quite equalledthat of the celebrated detective.
"Then," went on Stone, "I will ask you, if you please, to detail yourown occupations on last Wednesday."
"Beginning in the morning?" asked George.
"If you please."
"Well, let me see. I didn't get up very early, and after I did rise Istayed around here in my studio until luncheon time. During the morningI worked on several sketches for a book I am doing. About twelve o'clockI went uptown and lunched with a friend, a fellow-artist, at a littleGerman restaurant. After that I went and called for Miss MillicentWaring, whom I had invited to go with me to a matinee. I had expectedMrs. Waring to accompany us, but as she was ill she allowed Miss Waringto go with me alone, although it is not Miss Waring's habit to go aboutunchaperoned."
I couldn't help feeling a certain satisfaction in listening to youngLawrence's story. I was glad that his habits and his friends were all socorrect and so entirely free from the unconventionality which issometimes noticed in the social doings of young artists.
"We went to the matinee," continued George, "in Mrs. Waring's carriage,which also came for us, after the performance."
"One moment," said Fleming Stone. "You stopped nowhere, going orcoming?"
"No," said Lawrence; "nowhere."
"Except at the florist's," observed Stone quietly.
It may have been my imagination, but I thought that George started atthese words. However, he said in a cool, steady voice:
"Ah, yes, I had forgotten that. We stopped a moment to get some violetsfor Miss Waring."
"And after the matinee you drove home with Miss Waring?"
"Yes," said Lawrence; "and left her at her own door. She invited me tocome back to dinner, and I said I would. As the Warings' house is onlytwo blocks away from the Pembroke's, I thought I would run in for a fewmoments to see Janet. I did this, and Janet seemed glad to see me, butUncle Robert was so crusty and irritable that I did not care to stayvery long. I left there about six, came back here to my room, anddressed for dinner. From here I went directly back to the Warings',reaching there at 7.30, which was the dinner hour. There were otherguests, and after dinner there was music in the drawing-room. I stayeduntil eleven o'clock. As I said good-night to Miss Waring, the clockchanced to be striking eleven, so I'm sure of the time. From theWarings' I came right back here on a Broadway car. I reached this houseat 11.25, it having taken me about twenty-five minutes to come down fromSixtieth Street and to walk over here from Broadway."
"How do you know you reached this house at exactly 11.25?" Fleming Stoneasked this with such an air of cordial interest that there was no traceof cross-questioning about it.
"Because," said George easily, "my watch had stopped--it had run downduring the evening--and so as I came into this house I asked the hallboy what time it was, that I might set my watch. He looked at theoffice clock, and told me. Of course you can verify this by the boy."
"I've no desire to verify your statement, Mr. Lawrence," said Stone,with his winning smile. "It's a bad habit, this letting a watch rundown. Do you often do it?"
"No," said Lawrence; "almost never. Indeed, I don't know when it hashappened before."
"And then what next, Mr. Lawrence?"
"Then the hall boy brought me up in the elevator, I let myself into myrooms, and went at once to bed."
"Then the first intimation of your uncle's death you received the nextmorning?"
"Yes, when Janet telephoned to me. But she didn't say Uncle Robert wasdead. She merely asked me to come up there at once, and I went."
"What did you think she wanted you for?"
"I thought that either uncle was ill or she was herself, for she hadnever telephoned for me before in the morning."
"I thank you, Mr. Lawrence," said Fleming Stone, "for your frank andstraightforward account of this affair, and for your courteous answersto my questions. You know, of course, that it is the unpleasant duty ofa detective to ask questions unmercifully, in the hope of being set uponthe right track at last."
"I quite appreciate your position, my dear sir, and I trust I have givenyou all the information you desire. As I have told Mr. Landon, I have notaste for detective work myself, but I suppose it has to be done bysomebody."
After polite good-byes on both sides, we left Lawrence in his studio,and went down-stairs. Mr. Stone insisted on walking down, though it wasfour flights, and I, of course, raised no objection.
When we reached the ground floor he stepped into the office, which was asmall room just at the right of the entrance, and not far from theelevator.
After a glance at the office clock which stood on the desk, Mr. Stoneaddressed himself to the office boy.
"Do you remember," he said, "that Mr. Lawrence came in here lastWednesday night?"
"Yes, sir," said the boy; "I do."
"At what time was it?"
"Just twenty-five minutes after eleven, sir."
"How can you fix the time so exactly, my boy?"
"Because when Mr. Lawrence came in, his watch had stopped, and he askedme what time it was by the office clock."
"Couldn't he see for himself?"
"I suppose he could, sir, but, any way, he asked me, and I told him;and then I took him up in the elevator, and he was setting his watch onthe way u
p. Just before he got out he said: 'Did you say 11.25?' and Isaid, 'Yes.'"
"The office clock is always about right, I suppose?" said Mr. Stone,and, taking his watch from his pocket, he compared the two. There wasbut a minute's difference.
"Yes, sir, just about right; but that night I thought it was later whenMr. Lawrence come in. I was surprised myself when I see it wasn't halfpast eleven yet. But, of course, I must have made a mistake, for thisclock is never more than a couple of minutes out of the way."
"What time does your elevator stop running?"
"Not at all, sir, we run it all night."
"And other men came in after Mr. Lawrence did that night?"
"Oh, yes, sir; lots of them. These is bachelor apartments, you know, andthe men come in quite late--sometimes up till two or three o'clock."
Apparently Fleming Stone had learned all he wanted to know from the boy,and after he had thanked him and had also slipped into his hand a bit ofmore material reward, the interview was at an end.
We went out into the street again, and Fleming Stone said: "Now Ishould like to examine the Pembrokes' apartment."
"And shall you want to interview Miss Pembroke?" I inquired.
"Yes, I think so," he replied; "but we will look over the apartmentfirst."
"We'll have something to eat first," I declared; "and if you'll comehome with me, I'll guarantee that my sister will give you quite assatisfactory a luncheon as you could obtain in the best hotel in thecity."
"I've no doubt of it," said Stone pleasantly; "and I accept yourinvitation with pleasure. Will you wait for me a minute, while Itelephone?"
Before I had time to reply he had slipped in through a doorway at whichhung the familiar blue sign.
In a minute or two he rejoined me, and said: "Now let's dismiss thewhole affair from our minds until after luncheon. It is never wise tolet business interfere with digestion."
As we rode up home in the car, Mr. Stone was most agreeable andentertaining. Not a word was said of the Pembroke case--he seemed reallyto have laid aside all thought of it--and yet I couldn't help a sinisterconviction that when he telephoned it had been a message toheadquarters, authorizing the surveillance, if not the arrest, ofsomebody. It couldn't be Lawrence, in the face of that alibi; itcouldn't be Janet, for he knew next to nothing about her connection withthe matter; it couldn't be Charlotte, of course; and so it must havebeen "some person or persons unknown" to me.
I felt no hesitancy, so far as Laura was concerned, in taking home anunexpected guest, for it was my habit to do that whenever I chose, and Ihad never found Laura otherwise than pleased to see my friends, andamply able to provide hospitality for them. But, as we neared the house,I remembered Janet's strange disinclination to employ a detective, andher apparent horror at the mention of Fleming Stone's name.
Feeling that honesty demanded it, I told Fleming Stone exactly whatJanet had said on this subject when I had left the house that morning.Though apparently not disturbed personally by Miss Pembroke's attitudetoward him, he seemed to consider it as of definite importance for someother reason.
"Why should Miss Pembroke object to a detective's services," he said,"when, as you have told me, Mr. Lawrence said at your dinner table lastnight that he wanted to engage the best possible detective skill?"
"I don't know," I replied. "I'm puzzled myself. But I admit, Mr. Stone,that Miss Pembroke has been an enigma to me from the first. Not only doI believe her innocent, but I have a warmer regard for her than I amperhaps justified in mentioning to a stranger; and yet she is socontradictory in her speech and action from time to time that I simplydo not know what to think."
Fleming Stone turned a very kind glance on me. "The hardest puzzle inthis world," he said, "is a woman. Of course I do not know MissPembroke, but I hope she will consent to meet me, notwithstanding heraversion to detectives."
"I think she will," I said; "and, besides, she is so changeable that atthis moment she may be more anxious to see a detective than anybodyelse."
"Let us hope so," he said somewhat gravely. "It may be much to heradvantage."