CHAPTER XII MY SECRET
We went back into the house and Maud, with a smile at me, said:
“Keeley, I asked our super-sleuth, March, to scout around for a straycopy of that book that has in it the story of _The Nail_, and Graysie,here, is mad at me.”
“Nonsense!” I cried, “I’m not. But I daresay there were some thousands ofcopies of the book printed, and if, when and as you find one, you can’tat once assume that you have hit upon the murderer of Sampson Tracy.”
“That story is Maud’s angle of the case,” Kee said. “Her own exclusiveproperty and she must be allowed to exploit it as she likes. I’m free toconfess I haven’t much faith in it as a pointer, but I will say if thebook is found on the bedside table of any one who benefits by SampsonTracy’s death, it will be a lead that must be followed up.”
“Oh, all right,” I said, grumpily. “I can see you all suspect Alma Remsenmore or less, but why don’t you come out and say so?”
“Gray,” Keeley spoke a little sternly, “you’ve fallen in love with MissRemsen, and while that’s your own affair, you mustn’t assume that it atonce absolves her from all suspicion in this matter. Now, wait a minutebefore you explode. I don’t say the girl is suspected of crime, but thereis a possibility that she knows something she hasn’t told, just as Amesknew about that step in the hall, and just as you know something thatwild horses couldn’t drag out of you.”
“What do you mean?” I spluttered, angry and ashamed at the same time.
“You know what I mean. You have some bit of knowledge or information thatyou have been on the point of telling me half a dozen times, and thenhave concluded not to do so. I’m not asking you what it is, I’m notsaying it is your duty to tell. That’s your business. But I do say youhave no right to cavil at anything I may do in the interests of justice,and no reason to get upset if my investigations tend toward Alma Remsen’sconnection with the case.”
I was in love, I was upset, but after all, my sense of fairness was stillwith me.
“You’re right, Kee,” I said. “And I will not again let my admiration forMiss Remsen come into the question. Except where it concerns her, I amready to help, if I can, with your work, and I am sure you can give mechores to do, away from that line of inquiry. Let me interview others,there must be others, and you will find that I am not the fool you thinkme.”
“There, there, bless the boy,” Maud patted my arm, and though I mighthave resented her manner in another there was something about her kindlysympathy that made me welcome her friendly interest.
“Of course I think you a fool, Gray,” Moore assured me. “I’ve alwaysthought so. But, aren’t we all?”
“Of course we are,” chimed in Lora. “I wouldn’t give a fig for anyone whowasn’t a fool in some ways. Now, don’t think, Gray, your shy avowal isnews to us, for we knew you had fallen for the lovely Alma almost beforeyou knew it yourself. And we all approve, and look forward to a happyending. But for the moment, we are engrossed in another matter. Andthough Keeley says he is not going to urge you to tell us the secret youare withholding, I am, and I hope you will feel that it is better to letus know it.”
I thought a minute and then I said:
“Lora, you’re a dear, and I can scarce refuse you anything at all. Butthis thing I know, which may mean something or nothing, is so trivial, soinsignificant that I do not feel guilty in keeping it quiet, at least fora little time longer. Moreover, its weight, if it has any, would beagainst Alma’s interests, so please think I am justified in keepingstill.”
“You are, Gray,” Keeley said, heartily. “The more so, that I do not askfor evidence against the girl. If she is implicated at all, we haveenough evidence, what we want is admission on her part. So, keep your bitof information and should it become really necessary I’ll demand it.”
He nodded his head so understandingly that I saw we were reëstablished onthe old footing, and I rejoice that I had not told my secret.
For, whatever they said, I felt sure that a statement that I had seenAlma go to Pleasure Dome that fatal night at about one-thirty and hadprobably heard her return about two-thirty, would be something like amatch to a trail of gunpowder.
“Now,” Keeley went on, “I must do some real Sherlocking. First, as toHarper Ames. I’m inclined to scratch his name from my list of suspectsbecause of his frankly expressed desire that I should take the case forhim. Either he has the knowledge of his own absolute innocence, or elsehe is the very most clever devil I have ever chanced to run across.”
“He’s innocent all right,” Lora said. “He couldn’t act out all that. Hereally wants you to take the case, Kee, and that proves his innocence.”
“But does it?” Moore argued. “May it not be that he is the guilty man andhe is bold enough to think that by taking such a course he can steersuspicion away from himself?”
“Seems to me,” I put in, “that for a real Sherlock you are doing a lot oftheorizing and surmising. Why not get down to shreds of wool, missingcuff-links and dropped handkerchiefs?”
“Keeley isn’t a fictional detective,” Lora exclaimed. “He doesn’t work onconventional lines——”
“There are two kinds of fictional detectives, my dear girl,” Keeley toldher. “The detective of fiction, and the story-book sleuth who declaresthat he is _not_ the detective of fiction. The original detective offiction was the hound-on-the-scent sort. The man who could put two andtwo together. The wizard who could tell the height, weight, and colouringof the unknown criminal from a flick of cigar ash. Then, as this supermanpalled a bit on the reader, came then his successor, the man who scornedall these tricks of the trade and announced himself as not the detectiveof fiction.”
“And which sort are you?” asked Lora, brightly, with a hint of veiledchaffing.
“I’m a mixture of both,” Kee stated calmly. “But I do think one shouldconsider the bent and inclination of a suspect as well as the materialclues he leaves about.”
“For instance?” I asked.
“All that stuff left on the bed. Your old Sherlock type would say: ‘Theseflowers were placed here by an ex-gardener, with red hair and a missinglittle finger.’ But to my mind, the deduction would be that the flowerswere put there by a man the farthest possible remove from an ex-gardener,rather, a man of keen, sharp wits and decided ingenuity.”
“Merely as a blind, or, rather as a misleading clue?” I suggested.
“Yes. Now, the superfluity of those things on the bed, I mean themultiplicity of them, betokens a nature inclined to overdo. Like a manwho, getting on a steam-boat, ties himself on.”
“Or,” put in Lora, “if a man compel thee to go a mile, go with himtwain.”
“Yes, something of that sort. Yet it may be that he started on his madcareer of bed decorating and went on and on, sort of absent-mindedly.”
“Got started and couldn’t stop.”
“Exactly. Say he placed the flowers first, then, seeing the orange andcrackers, added those, then, noticing the crucifix, used that; then thehandkerchief, and finally draped the scarf round them all, just becauseit was handy by.”
“And the watch in the pitcher?”
“Oh, that dratted thing! That throws the whole matter into anothercategory. That watch is my hope and my stumbling block, both.”
“You’ve been mysterious before, Kee, about that watch. Now out with it.What’s the separate mystery of the watch in the pitcher?”
“_Quid pro quo_,” said Kee, smiling at me. “You tell me what you’reconcealing up your sleeve and I’ll divulge the dark hint suggested to meby the watch.”
I hesitated, but my disinclination to tell of the canoe incident was toostrong. I couldn’t bring myself to let loose a torrent of suspicion thatmight engulf Alma.
“Can’t do it,” I said, honestly. “I would, if I thought it my duty as acitizen or as your friend, Kee. But, as I see it, it’s better leftuntold.”
“You remind me,”
Kee said, smiling, “of Jurgen, who said, ‘I do my dutyas I see it. But there is a tendency in my family toward defectivevision.’ That isn’t quoted _verbatim_, but nearly so. All right, old son,keep your guilty secret and I’ll keep mine.”
“Do. What’s next on your sleuthing program?”
“I’m going to interview Mrs. Dallas.”
“How will she like that?”
“I daresay she won’t be any too well pleased. But, unless she refuses tosee us, we can’t help learning something. Will you go with me?”
“Of course,” I returned, glad he wanted me. I truly desired to help, solong as the work didn’t touch on the girl I cared for.
The talk with them about her had, in a way, crystallized my feelings, andI knew now I loved her, a fact of which I had before been only vaguelyaware.
Also, I was prepared to fight for her. And if the fight could be helpedon by incriminating some one else, so much the better.
We started for Mrs. Dallas’s home, which was only a short walk along thelake shore.
Keeley was quiet as usual, and gave me fully to understand that he boreno ill will over my refusal to confide in him more fully.
“You see, Gray,” he said, talking things over with me in the old,friendly fashion, “there’s no use blinking the accepted fact that thosewho benefit most by the death of a rich man are the ones to be suspected.I know how you feel about Alma, but as you care for her, you, of course,deem her innocent. Therefore you can’t feel that she is in any dangerfrom an investigation by detectives. If I were you I should welcome allpossible questioning of her, feeling sure that she would havesatisfactory explanation for anything that might seem suspicious.”
“That’s all very well, Kee, if the detectives were not such dunderheadedidiots. You know I don’t mean you, but that March Hare and that Hart thatpanted at the inquest, have it in for the girl, and they are ready toturn anything she may say against her.”
“Oh, not so bad as that. But it complicates things, your having gonedotty over her.”
“Sorry for the complications, but not sorry for the rest of it. I say,old man, do you suppose she’d look at me?”
“She might do worse,” said Kee, as he eyed me appraisingly.
Although he spoke lightly I welcomed his words as a good omen and turnedin at the Dallas place, determined to do all I could to help him.
It was a pleasant cottage, unpretentious and homelike, and we wereadmitted by a trim-looking maid, and conducted to a small reception room.
“Come over here,” said a voice, a moment later, and we saw KatherineDallas smiling at us from the door of the big living room opposite.
She was charming, both in appearance and manner, and greeted us withcourtesy if not warmth.
But she clearly showed she considered it an interview rather than asocial call and waited for Kee to state his errand.
“Mr. Ames has asked me to look into the matter of Mr. Tracy’s death,”Moore began, shamelessly hiding behind Ames’s skirts. “And though Iregret the necessity, I feel I must ask you a few questions which I hopeyou will be gracious enough to answer.”
“Yes,” she returned, not at all helpfully, though in no way forbidding.
I saw by the play of Keeley’s features that he had sized her up and hadconcluded to carry on the interview in strictly business fashion.
“You were Mr. Tracy’s fiancée at the time of his death?” he asked.
“Yes, Mr. Moore, I was.”
“Then, as such, as the one holding the nearest relationship to him, if weexcept his niece, Miss Remsen, am I correct in assuming you desire thediscovery of the criminal who is responsible for his death?”
“No, Mr. Moore, you are not correct in that assumption. I loved Mr.Tracy, I hoped to marry him, but now that he is dead, I should greatlyprefer that the matter be considered a closed book. I am not of avindictive nature and to me the horrors of an investigation and all theharrowing details of such a procedure would be only less distressing thanthe tragedy itself. So far as I am concerned, I should infinitely preferthat the name of the wretch who cruelly killed Sampson Tracy should beburied in oblivion to having it sought for and blazoned to the publicgaze.”
“This is not the usual view to take of such a situation, Mrs. Dallas.”Kee’s tone conveyed distinct reproach.
“The usual view has never meant anything to me, nor does it in thisinstance.”
She was not exactly flippant, but there was a note in her voice thatproved, to my mind at least, that she resented any discussion of hermental attitude, and indeed, resented the whole interview and ourpresence.
Clearly, no help could be expected from her, yet I was moved to put a fewstraightforward questions.
“Are you remaining here, Mrs. Dallas, for the rest of the summer?”
She favoured me with a glance that was strongly disapproving of such anintrusive remark, and answered, icily:
“That I have not yet decided.”
“You know the terms of the will?” Kee shot at her, suddenly, havingdecided, as he afterward told me, that she was unworthy of delicateconsideration.
“Yes,” she said, with a face void of expression.
“Then, as one of the principal beneficiaries, you know that you cannotexpect to escape definite questioning by the detectives.”
“I do not expect to escape it, nor do I fear it. Why are you telling methis, Mr. Moore?”
“I thought you understood that as Mr. Ames’s adviser, I must make certaininquiries in the course of pursuing my duties.”
She thawed a little, and said, half apologetically, “I suppose so. Isthere anything else I can tell you?”
“Yes, Mrs. Dallas. Since Mr. Tracy is dead, have you any intention ofmarrying any one else?”
“I think, Mr. Moore, you are carrying your zeal for Mr. Ames’s work toofar. I must beg to be excused from further conversation.”
She rose and stood, like a tragedy queen, not angry, but with a scornfullook on her handsome face and an expression in her eyes eloquent ofdismissal. She did not point to the door, but such a gesture was notnecessary with that look in her eyes.
Courteously and with no effect of chagrin, Kee bowed his adieu and Ifollowed suit.
“Whew!” I remarked, after we had regained the outer road, “some goddess!”
“Amazon! Boadicea! Xantippe! Medea!—yes, and Lucrezia Borgia!” heexclaimed, his voice making up in emphasis what it lacked in sound. “Thiscase begins to look interesting, Gray. What price Everett and the Dallasin cahoots as murderers?”
“Are you serious?” I asked, thinking he was merely smarting under thelady’s stinging rebuke.
“No, I don’t think so. There are more likely suspects. But we learned alot there. I honestly hated to bang her between the eyes as I did, butshe was just about to order us out anyway, and I had to find out herstate of mind regarding Everett.”
“And did you?”
“Of course I did. Her sudden flush of colour and the ghastly fear thatcame into her eyes for an instant told me the truth. Gray, she not onlyloves Charles Everett, but she is not at all certain that he is not themurderer.”
“That lets her out, then.”
“Oh, of course.... She never committed murder. And, she was at home inbed when the deed was done. She was at our party that night, you know.”
“Yes, I know, but she went home early.”
“Oh, well, there’s not the slightest suspicion attached to her. When Isaid in cahoots, I didn’t really mean it, or, if I did, I look on her asmerely a sleeping partner. But I think she is entirely innocent of crime,or even accessory work, and I think, too, that she fears for Everett.Maybe not that he did the deed, but that he may be suspected of it. Idon’t like the woman, I never did, but I think she’s innocent of any realwrong. I think she was engaged to Tracy for purely mercenary reasons,then Everett came along, and she fell for him, and she is now glad thatold Samp is out of the way, but she didn’t bring it about.”
“Probably you’
re right, Kee, but I don’t hanker after any more calls onsuspects if they’re going to be as strenuous as that.”
“Oh, that’s nothing—all in the day’s work. All right, then, if you’re offthe case for to-day. I’m going over to Whistling Reeds, but you cantoddle home, if you like.”
“You’re going there? To Alma’s? Indeed I will go with you. What are yougoing for?”
“On a quest for knowledge and information.” He spoke gravely.
“Are you going to torment her, Kee?” I asked.
“Not intentionally. But I must ask some questions and she must answer.Now, go or stay away, as you choose.”
“I’ll go,” I said, and we walked a while in silence.
Reaching our own boathouse, Kee chose his favourite round-bottomed boatand we started for the Island.
I rowed, for I felt the need of some physical exertion to calm my racingnerves, stirred by the thought of the ordeal ahead of us.
Keeley had not suspected Mrs. Dallas—he said so—but I had a feeling hedid suspect Alma, and I wondered what his attitude would be.
“Don’t be harsh with her,” I said, at last, apparently apropos ofnothing.
“I’m not utterly a brute,” he returned, and I bent to my oars.
It was a gray day. The clouds hid the sun entirely and they were dullheavy clouds, not fleecy white ones such as I loved. The lake was leaden,and the ripples waved slowly but did not break into whitecaps.
There were no other boats in sight and no crowds of merry people on thefew docks we passed.
Reaching the Remsen boathouse, it seemed to me the Island looked morethan ever like an abode of the dead. The trees were motionless in thecalm air and the dark glades and copses seemed sepulchral in theirsentinel-like rigidity.
We landed and went up the steps toward the house.
A man advanced to meet us.
“What’s wanted?” he said, not quite gruffly, but with an apparentintention of being answered.
“We want to see Miss Remsen,” Kee replied and his manner was suavityitself. “I am Keeley Moore, from Variable Winds, down the lake. This ismy friend, Mr. Norris. Take us to the house, Mr. Merivale, and announceus to Miss Remsen.”
“Announce you, is it? When I’m tellin’ you she isn’t home!”
He hadn’t told us that before, but he seemed to think he had, and hestood directly in our path, so that we could advance no step.
“Where is she, please?”
“She and Merry—that’s my wife, sir—have gone down to the village.”
“And nobody’s home?”
“Nobody but me and one or two kitchen servants.”
“Well, let us sit on the porch a few moments. Mr. Norris is all tuckeredout with his row over here, and I’ve got to row back. So, maybe you’llgive us a drink of water; if Mrs. Merivale was at home, I’d ask for tea.”
The strange-looking man seemed to relent a little.
He was an enormous, strapping fellow, not fierce-looking but of powerfulbuild and a strong, forceful countenance. He gazed at us out of deep-seteyes overhung with shaggy eyebrows of stiff gray hair.
“Come along, then,” he said. “You can sit on the porch, and I’ll make youa cup of tea. I can make better tea than Merry.”
But as he turned to leave us, he said, with a slight smile:
“If so be you gentlemen could put up with a drop of Scotch and soda, it’dsave me boilin’ the kettle.”
We agreed to put up with the substitute, and he went off.
We said little during the old man’s absence. I felt relieved that Kee didnot insist on going into the house, and I sat looking about at thebeautiful though gloomy landscape.
Yet, viewed from the porch, it was not so bad. The flower beds gaveenough colour, and the near-by trees were mostly white birch, with theirgraceful shapes and pale, lovely trunks.
Yet between us and the lake was a solid wall of dark, dense woodland thatshut off all view of the outer world and shut in the Island and itsbuildings and people.
“I can’t see why Alma likes this place,” I said, in a low voice. “Shedoesn’t seem at all morbid or despondent herself.”
“Do you know her?” Keeley asked me, and I suddenly realized that I didn’tknow her at all! But, I promised myself, that was a defect that timeshould remedy and that, I hoped, soon.
From where I sat, I could see into the house through a window. I lookedinto the same room we had been in the other day I had called here, theday when Merry had told us if we were men to let the poor girl alone.
As I looked, not curiously, only idly, I saw the old man, Merivale, comeinto the room and adjust a record and then turn on a victrola.
The strains of Raff’s Cavatina floated out to us, and Kee gave a littlesmile of enjoyment.
A moment later, Merivale appeared with glasses on a tray, and I said,pleasantly, “Your music sounds fine, out here on the lake.”
He looked up suddenly, saw the open window and frowned.
“That Katy!” he exclaimed. “She’s forever turnin’ on that machine! Do youmind it, sir?” He looked anxiously at Kee.
“No,” was the reply, but I marvelled as to why this cheerful old liarshould put the blame on poor, innocent Katy, for a deed that I had seenhim do himself.