CHAPTER XXIII--MOLLY'S STORY
After that Monday night when he went off in a rage, Ferguson didn't showup at Grasslands for several days and I had the place to myself and allthe time I wanted. Believe me, I wanted a lot and made use of it. Whilethe others were concentrating on the kidnaping--the big thing that hadabsorbed all their interest--I went back to the job I was engaged for,the robbery. And I went back with a fresh eye, the old idea cleared outof my head by Mrs. Price's confession.
She'd explained the light, the light by the safe at one-thirty. Withthat out of the way, I could get busy on the cigar band. I was justaching to do it, for, as I'd told Ferguson, it was an A1 starting point.Given that, there's nothing more exciting in the world than tracking upfrom it, following different leads, seeing if they'll dovetail, puttingbits together like a picture puzzle.
So I started in and for two days collected data, ferreted into themovements of every person on the place, gossiped round in the village,picked up a bit here and a scrap there, and made notes at night in myroom. I broke down Dixon's dignity and had a long talk with him; I gotEllen to show me how to knit a sweater and before I'd learnt had herinside out. I spent two hours and broke my best scissors spoiling thelock of the bookcase in my room and had Isaac up to try keys on it. WhenI was done I knew the movements of everybody in the house on the nightof July seventh as if I'd personally conducted each one through thatimportant and exciting evening.
It wasn't love of the work alone, or the feeling that I ought to earn mysalary, that pushed me on. There was something else--I wanted to clearEsther Maitland. I wanted it bad. I kept thinking of her eyes looking atme when I gave her the drink of water and it made me sort of sick. In mythoughts I kept telling my husband about it, and I always tried to makeout I'd acted very smart and some way or other I knew he wouldn't thinkso. It wasn't that I felt guilty--I'd done nothing but what I was hiredfor--but there's a meanness about beating a person down, there's ameanness about staring into their white, twisted face and saying,"Ha--Ha--you're cornered and I did it!" You have to be awfully goodyourself to do that sort of thing.
Thursday morning I'd got all I could and with my notes and my fountainpen I went out on the side piazza by Miss Maitland's study; there was atable there and it was quiet and secluded. So I fixed everythingconvenient and set to work. Taking the cigar band as the central point Ibuilt up from it something like this:
It had been dropped by a man--so few women smoke cigars you could putthat down as certain. It had been dropped between half-past eight whenthe storm stopped and half-past ten when Miss Maitland found it. The mancould not be Mr. Janney who had driven both ways, nor Dixon or Isaac whohad walked to the village by the road and come back the same route. Itcouldn't have been Otto the chauffeur as he had stayed at Ferguson'sgarage visiting there with Ferguson's men. The head gardener had gone tothe movies with the other Grasslands servants, and the under gardenershad been in their own homes in the village as I had taken pains to findout. Therefore it was no man living on the place at that time.
But that it was some one who was familiar with the house and itsinterior workings was proved by two facts:--that the dogs, heard tostart barking, had suddenly quieted down, and that a rose from MissMaitland's dress had been found inside the safe.
An expert burglar could have got round all the rest, had a key to thefront door, worked out the combination--the house was virtually emptyfor over two hours--it was known that the family and servants were out.But the most expert burglar in the world couldn't have controlled thosedogs--Mrs. Price's Airdale was as savage to strangers as a wolf and hada bark on it like a steam calliope.
The rose figured as a proof this way: It had been put inside the safe tothrow suspicion on Miss Maitland, the thief was aware that she knew thecombination. This would argue that he was acquainted with the habits ofthe household. All social secretaries are not given the leeway MissMaitland was; all social secretaries aren't given the combination of asafe where two hundred thousand dollars' worth of jewels are kept. Theman knew she had it, and tried to fix the guilt on her. Where his planslipped up was Mrs. Price coming later, finding the rose, salting itdown in a piece of tissue paper, and, for some reason of her own, notsaying a word about it.
How did he get the rose? As far as I could see there was just one way.Esther Maitland had spent part of the afternoon of July the seventhaltering her evening dress. Ellen had pinned it up on her and she'dtaken the waist down to her study to sew on as her room was too hot.When she'd gone upstairs again--it was Ellen who gave me all this--she'dleft part of the trimming on the desk. The next morning the parlor maidhad given it to Ellen--all cut and picked apart, some of the roses loosein a cardboard box--to put in Miss Maitland's room. It had lain on thedesk all night and, in my opinion, the thief had either known it wasthere or found it, taken the rose, and made his "plant" with it.
Now one man who would be familiar to the dogs and might know MissMaitland's privileges and habits, was Chapman Price. But it wasn't he,for at nine-thirty, the hour when the thief was busy, Mr. Price wascrossing the Queensborough bridge, headed for New York. And anyway, ifhe hadn't been, you couldn't suspect him of trying to lay the blame onthe girl who was his partner. No--Chapman Price was wiped off the mapwith all the rest of the Grasslands crowd.
When I'd got this far I sat biting my pen handle and sizing it up. Athief, professional, had taken the jewels. He was some one unknown,having no connection with Mr. Price or Miss Maitland. The two crimesthat had nearly shaken the Janney family off its throne had beencommitted by different parties. I was as sure of that as that the sunwould rise to-morrow.
After dinner that evening I went out on the balcony and sat there,turning it all over in my head, and looking at the woods, black-edgedand solid against the night sky. It was very still, not a breath, andpresently, off across the garden, I heard the gravel crunch under afoot, a soft padding on the grass, and then a long, lean figure cameinto the brightness that shot out across the drive from the hall behindme--Ferguson.
He dropped down on the top step, settled his back against one of theroof posts, and took out a cigarette case. He was right where the lightshone on him, and I could see he had a serious, glum look which made methink he still "had a mad on me" as they say on the east side. Thatdidn't trouble me; people getting mad when they've a reason to neverdoes, and he'd reason enough, poor dear.
Puffing out a long shoot of smoke, he said:
"I've come over to speak to you about that idea of mine--that cigar bandI told you about."
"Oh," I answered, "you've got round to that, have you?"
"I have, or perhaps you might say half way around."
"Well, I'm the whole way. I've spent three days getting there."
"I thought you'd beat me to it. What have you arrived at?"
"The certainty that the man who dropped the band was the thief."
"We're agreed at last. Have you gone far enough round to come to asuspect?"
"No, I'm stuck there."
He blew out a ring, watched it float away into the darkness and said:
"So am I. But I've a small, single compartment brain that can'taccommodate more than one idea at a time. And it's busy just now inanother direction. If you'll put that forty horse-power one of yours onthis we ought to get round the whole way." He glanced sideways at me,his eyes full of meaning. "You'll find I can be a very grateful person."
"Gratitude's a kind of pay I like."
"Yes--it's stimulating and it can take more than one form." He flungaway the cigarette, leaned back against the post and said: "The worst ofit is that our main exhibit, the cigar band, is gone. I looked for itlast night and found it was lost."
"Lost!" I sat up quick. He'd told me where he kept it and right off Ithought it was funny. "Gone out of that box you had it in?"
"Yes. I wanted to see it when I came in--I'd been in town--and it wasn'tin the box."
"Had it been there recently?"
"Um--I can't tell just how recently--perhaps a we
ek ago."
"Did you ask about it?"
"Yes, I asked Willitts. He said he hadn't seen it."
"Didn't you tell me you kept studs and jewelry in that box?"
"I did; that's what it's for. I don't see how he could have helpedseeing it. I daresay he did and, thinking it was of no use, threw itaway and then, when he saw I wanted it, got scared and lied."
A thing like a zigzag of lightning went through me. It stabbed down frommy head to my feet, giving my heart a whack as it passed. My voicesounded queer as I spoke:
"He could have known, couldn't he, of that walk you and Miss Maitlandtook, that walk when you found the band?"
He had been looking, dreamy and indifferent, out into the darkness. Nowhe turned to me, a little surprised, as if he was wondering at myquestions:
"I suppose so. He knew all my crowd up there; they're forever runningback and forth from one place to the other. They know everything, andthey're the greatest gossips and snobs in the country. I've no doubt heheard it talked threadbare--the boss walking home with Mrs. Janney'ssecretary. Probably gave their social sensibilities a jolt."
Something lifted me out of my chair, carried me across the balcony,plunked me down beside him on a lower step. I craned up my head near tohis and I'll never forget the expression of his face, sort of blank, asif he wasn't sure whether I'd gone crazy or was going to kiss him.
"Some one who knew the family, some one who knew it was out that night,some one who knew Miss Maitland had the combination, some one who couldhave got a key to the front door, some one _the dogs were friendlywith_!"
He was staring at me as if he was hypnotized--getting a gleam of it butnot the full light. I put my hands on his shoulders and gave them ashake.
"You simp, wake up. It's Willitts!"