CHAPTER XVI The Snowflake
I looked at the design with interest, but without at first grasping itstrue significance.
Pennington Wise looked at it aghast. "Where did it come from?" heexclaimed.
"It's always been there," said Zizi. "I mean, I saw it there one day whenI was in this room with Mr. Hudson, I--I----"
"Didn't know you'd ever been here, Ziz," and Wise smiled at the earnestlittle face.
"Yep, I was; and I happened to move the telephone, and under it was thatdrawing. I didn't think anything about it, as evidence, but I looked atit 'cause it was so pretty. And I put the telephone back over it again."
"But I searched this room," and Wise looked mystified.
"You probably didn't lift the telephone, then," Zizi returned, shakingher elfin head, while a deep sorrow showed in her black eyes.
"I don't believe I did," Wise mused, thinking back. "I did pick up mostof the desk fittings to examine them but I suppose I didn't take hold ofthe telephone at all."
"'Course not!" Zizi was always ready to defend Wise's actions. "How couldyou know there was a picture under it? But, oh, Penny, what does itmean?"
"Wait,--let's get at it carefully. On the face of it, it would seem as ifCase Rivers must have drawn this figure of a snow crystal. Everybody hassome peculiar habit, and especially, lots of people have a habit ofdrawing some particular thing when waiting at a telephone.
"I've asked half a dozen men of late, and every one says he scribbleswords or draws some crude combination of lines. But each one says healways does the same thing, whatever it may be. Now, I imagine, very fewmen draw snow crystals,--and fewer still, draw them with this degree ofperfection. Again, granting they did, would any other individual drawthis identical design, with this accuracy of drawing, that Case Riversdrew on the desk-blotter at your house, Brice?"
"I should say it would be impossible that anyone else could have doneit," I replied, honestly, though I began to see where our investigationwas leading us.
"It _is_ impossible," declared Wise. "Two men might draw snow crystals,but they would not both choose this particular one."
"It's exactly the same," Zizi murmured, "for I brought Mr. Brice's withme: here it is."
Calmly the girl took from her little hand-bag a piece torn from mydesk-blotter. It held the drawing done by Rivers while he was waiting forhis telephone call and it was the precise duplicate of the figure drawnon the blotter of Amos Gately's mahogany desk.
"The same pencil--or, rather, the same hand drew those two," Wise said,positively, and I could not contradict this.
Snow crystals are said by scientists to show hundreds of differentshapes, and almost any illustrated dictionary or text-book of naturalscience shows several specimens. This one we were looking at was ofsimple but beautiful design and I felt sure Rivers had copied it fromsome picture as one can rarely keep a real snowflake long enough to copyits form.
Anyway it was stretching the law of coincidence a little too far tobelieve that two men would idly draw the same form on a desk-blotterwhile telephoning.
Of course, this sketch on Amos Gately's desk need not have been madewhile the artist's other hand held the telephone receiver, but itsjuxtaposition to the instrument indicated that it was.
"Of course, Mr. Rivers drew this," Zizi declared, her little head bobbingas she turned her black eyes from one of us to the other.
She wore a small turban made entirely of red feathers,--soft breastfeathers of some tropical bird, I suppose. The hat set jauntily on hersleek black hair, and the motions of her head were so quick and birdlike,that she gave me a fleeting remembrance of the human birds I saw in theplay of _Chantecler_.
"Of course he did," assented Wise, very gravely; "and now we must go on.Granting, for the moment, that Case Rivers,--as we call him,--drew thislittle sketch, he must have been in this office the day of Amos Gately'smurder. For I've been told that the blotter on this desk was changedevery day, and any marks or blots now on it were therefore made on thatday. If he did it, then,--or, rather, when he did it, he was telephoningto somebody----"
"Well," put in Zizi, "perhaps he was just sitting here, talking to Mr.Gately. Maybe, he might draw those things when he just sits idly as wellas when he telephones."
"Yes; you're right. Well, at any rate, he must have been sitting here,opposite Mr. Gately, on that very day. And I opine he was telephoning,but that makes no difference. Now, if he was here, in this office, onthat day,--what was he here for, and who is he?"
"He is the murderer," said Zizi, but she spoke as if she were a machine.The words seemed to come from her lips without her own volition; hervoice was wooden, mechanical, and her eyes had a far-away, vacant gaze."I don't know who he is, but he is the man who shot Mr. Gately."
"Oh, come, now, Ziz," Wise shook her gently, "wake up! Don't jump atconclusions. He may be the most innocent man in New York. He may havebeen in here calling on Gately early in the day, and his errand may havebeen of the most casual sort. He may have had cause to telephone, and ashe sat waiting for his call, he sketched the snowflake pattern, which ishis habit when waiting. But that he was here that day is a positivefact,--to my mind. Now, it's for us to find out what he was here for, andwho he is. I don't favor going to him and asking him pointblank. Thatpeculiar phase of amnesia from which he is suffering is a precariousmatter to deal with. A sudden shock might bring back his memory,--or, itmight----"
"Addle his brain!" completed Zizi. "All right, oh, Most Wise Guy! Butwhen you do find out the truth, it will be that Case Rivers in his rightmind and in his own proper person killed Mr. Gately."
"Hush up, Ziz! If you have such a fearful hunch keep it to yourself. I'mnot going to believe that, unless I have to! It has always been myconviction that Rivers is,--or was, a worthwhile man. I feel sure he wasof importance in some line,--some big line. Moreover, I believe his yarnabout falling through the earth."
"You do!" I cried, in amazement. "You stand for that! You believe he fellinto the globe at Canada,--or some Northern country, and fell out againin New York City?"
"Not quite that," and Wise smiled. "But I believe he had some mightystrange experience, of which his tale is a pretty fair description, ifnot entirely the literal truth."
"Such as?"
"Why, suppose he fell down a mine shaft in Canada. Suppose that knockedout his memory. Then suppose he was rescued and sent to New York fortreatment, say, at some private hospital or sanitarium. Then suppose heescaped, and, still loony, threw himself into the East River--oh, I don'tknow--only, there are lots of ways that he could have that notion abouthis fall through the earth, and have something real to base it on."
"Gammon and spinach!" I remarked, my patience exhausted; "the man had ablow or a fall or something that jarred his memory, but his 'fallingthrough the earth' idea is a hallucination, pure and simple. However,that doesn't matter. Now we must follow this new trail, and see if we canget a line on his personality. He can't tell us what he was here for,--ifhe doesn't remember that he was here."
"Perhaps he does remember," Wise spoke musingly.
"Nixy!" and Zizi's saucy head nodded positively; "Mr. Rivers is sincerenow, whatever he was before. He doesn't remember shooting Mr. Gately----"
"Stop that, Zizi!" Wise spoke more sharply than I had ever heard him. "Iforbid you to assume that Rivers is the murderer,--you are absurd!"
"But I've got a hunch--" Zizi's black eyes stared fixedly at Wise,"and----"
"Keep your hunch to yourself! I told you that before! Now, hush up."
Not at all abashed, Zizi made a most wicked little _moue_ at him, but shesaid no more just then.
"We have a new direction in which to look, though," Wise went on, "and wemust get about it. You remember, we found a hatpin here that led us toSadie, 'The Link,' as straight as a signboard could have done."
"Yes," scoffed Zizi, "with the help of Norah and her powder-paper, andJenny and her tattle-tongue!"
&
nbsp; "All right," Wise was unperturbed; "we got her all the same. Now, perhapsthe Man Who Fell Through the Earth also left some indicative clews. Let'slook round."
"He couldn't leave anything more indicative than the drawing on theblotter," persisted Zizi. "He drew on Mr. Brice's blotter today and hedrew on this blotter of Mr. Gately's the day Mr. Gately was killed. Thatmuch is certain."
"So it is, Zizi," agreed Wise; "but nothing further is certain as yet.But we may find something more."
As he talked the detective rummaged in the desk drawers. He pulled outthe packet of papers that had interested him before.
"I'd like to read these," he said; "you see, they're dated inchronological order, and they must mean something."
"It's where they come from," said Zizi, with an air of wisdom; "you see,Waldorf means a certain message in their code book, and St. Regis meansanother; Biltmore paper means another, and so on."
"Right you are, as usual," Wise said, so approvingly that Zizi smiled allover her queer little countenance.
"Part of 'The Link's' spy business," she went on, and I cried out indenial.
"Oh, come off, Mr. Brice," she said, "you may as well admit, first aslast, that you know Mr. Gately was mixed up in this spy racket. I don'tknow yet just how deeply or how knowingly----"
"You mean," I caught at the straw, "that he was a go-between, but didn'tknow it?"
"I thought that at first," said Wise, "I hoped it was so. That, ofcourse, would argue that he was infatuated with Sadie and she wound himround her finger and used him to further her schemes, while he himselfwas innocent. But the theory, though a pretty one, won't work. Gatelywasn't quite gullible enough for that, and, too, he is more deeplyconcerned in it all than we know."
"Yes," I agreed; "these letters,--I mean, these blank sheets,--were sentto him by mail. One came the day after he died."
"I know it. And, as Zizi says, they mean something definite in accordancewith a prepared code. For instance, a sheet of Hotel Gotham paper, datedDecember tenth, might mean that a certain transport, indicated in thecode book by that hotel, was to sail on that date."
"That's a simple, child's-play explanation," said Zizi,--"but it may bethe right one."
"Certainly," Wise assented, "there may be other explanations and morecomplicated ones. But it doesn't matter now. The receipt of theseletters,--blank letters,--was of secret value to Gately, and proves himto have been pretty deeply mixed up in it all."
"But what about Mr. Rivers?" spoke up Zizi; "where does he come in?"
"It looks black," Wise declared. "He was here that day secretly. That is,he didn't come in at Jenny's door. She doesn't recognize him, I askedher. Therefore, he came in by one of these other doors, or up in thesecret elevator. In either case, he didn't want his visit known. So he isa wrongdoer, with Gately, and--probably, with Rodman. They're all tarredwith the same brush. The trail of the spy serpent is over them all."
"No!" cried Zizi, and her face was stormy, "my nice Mr. Rivers isn't anyspy! He hasn't anything to do with that spy matter!"
"Why!" I exclaimed; "you said he was the murderer!"
"Well, I'd rather be a murderer than a spy!" Her eyes snapped and herwhole thin little body quivered with indignation. "A murder is a decentcrime compared to spy work! Oh, my nice Mr. Rivers!"
She broke down and cried convulsively.
"Let her alone," said Wise, not unkindly, after a brief glance at theshaking little figure. "She's always better for a crying spell. It clearsher atmosphere. Now, Brice, let's get busy. As Zizi says, you must admitthat there's no doubt that Amos Gately was pretty deeply into the game.Even if he was unduly friendly with Sadie Kent, it was indubitablythrough and because of their dealings together in the stolen telegrambusiness. The way I see it is that Sadie sold her intercepted messages tothe highest bidder. This was George Rodman, but above him was AmosGately. Oh, don't look so incredulous. It isn't the first time a bankpresident has gone wrong on the side. Gately never was unfaithful to hisoffice, he never misappropriated funds or anything of that sort, but forsome reason or other, whether money gain, or hope of other reward, he didbetray his country."
I couldn't deny it,--or, rather, I could deny it, but only because of mystill unshattered faith in Amos Gately. I could bring no proof of mydenial.
"But," I said, musingly, "we haven't yet proved Gately mixed up in----"
"What!" cried Wise; "isn't this enough proof? These blank letters, forthat's what they are,--the proved visit here of Sadie, 'The Link,' andthe fact that Gately was shot,--by someone,--with no known reason,--allthat goes to show that the murderer had some secret motive, some unknowncause for getting Gately out of the way."
"I see it, as you put it," I said, "but I will not believe Amos Gately aspy,--or conniving at spy business until I have to. I shall continue tobelieve he was a tool--an innocent tool--of the Rodman and Sadie Kentcombination."
"All right, Brice, keep your faith as long as you can, but, I tell you,you'll soon have to admit that I'm right. Gately, as we all know, was apeculiar man. He had few friends, he had little or no social life, and hedid have secret callers and a secret mode of entrance and exit from hisoffices. All this shows something to hide,--it is unexplainable for a manwho has nothing to conceal."
"All right, Wise," I said, finally, "I suppose you _are_ right. But stillwe must continue our search for the murderer. We don't seem to progressmuch in that matter."
"Not yet, but soon," Wise said, optimistically; "the ax is laid at theroot of the tree,--we are on the right track----"
"Meaning Case Rivers?" I cried, in alarm.
"Meaning Case Rivers,--perhaps," he returned. "I'm not as sure as Zizi isthat the evidence points to him as the murderer, but we must concludethat he was in this room the day of the murder,--and what else could hehave been here for?"
"What else?" I stormed. "Dozens of things! Hundreds of things! Why, manalive, every person who set foot in this room on that day didn'tnecessarily kill Amos Gately!"
"Every person who set foot in this room on that day is his potentialmurderer," Wise returned, calmly. "Every person must be suspected,--or,at least, investigated."
"Well," I said, after realizing that he spoke truly, "you investigate thequestion of Rivers' visit here that day. I don't want to do that. But I'mgoing down to Headquarters now, and perhaps I'll dig up something ofimportance."
And I did. A visit to the Chief told me the interesting tale of thefurther discoveries of Sadie Kent's industries. It seems the Federalagents had found a complete and powerful wireless station in a cottage atSoutheast Beach, a fairly popular summer resort. The cottage wasseemingly untenanted, but some unexplained wires which ran along therafters of an adjoining house led to the discovery of the auxiliarywireless station.
Experts had broken into the locked house and had found a cleverlyconcealed keyboard of a wireless apparatus. Further search had disclosedthe whole thing, and, moreover, had brought out the fact, that theadjoining cottage was occupied by two apparently innocent old people, whowere really in the employ of Sadie Kent.
"The Link" was a person of importance, and though she passed for a meretelegraph operator, she was one of the most important links in the Germanspy system in the United States.
In the room where the wireless apparatus was found there were alsoquantities of letter paper from the various hotels of New York City.
These sheets, abstracted from the writing-rooms of the hotels, were thecode system used in forwarding the stolen intelligence.
It all hung together, and the bunch of those hotel papers found inGately's desk, and especially the fact that one reached his address theday after his demise proved, beyond all doubt, his implication in thedespicable business.
Now, I thought, to what extent or in what way was Case Rivers concerned?Surely the man had been in Gately's office on that fatal day. I had noidea that he had killed the banker,--that was only Zizi'sfoolishness,--but he had certainly been there.
It came to me suddenly that if Rivers c
ould be taken again to the Gatelyoffices, the rooms, the associations, might possibly bring back his lostmemory, and let him reinstate himself in his real personality. To besure, this might prove him the murderer, but if so, it would be only thecourse of justice; and, on the other hand, if it explained his innocentor casual call on Gately that, too, was what the man deserved.
And so I went at once to see Rivers. I found him in his rooms, the oneshe had taken while he was to assist Wise in his work, and he greeted mecordially.
"The plot thickens," he said as I told him of Sadie's wireless station."I knew that girl was a sly one. She's one of the most important peoplein the big spy web. She's one of their spyders, who spin a pretty web andattract gullible flies. Amos Gately fell for her charms,--you know,Brice, she is a siren,--and somehow she lured him into the web she sodeftly spun. To my mind, Gately was a good, upright citizen, who fell fora woman's wiles. I'm not sure about this, it may be he was mixed up inspy work before Sadie came on the scene,--but I'm certain she wasaccessory before, during, or after the fact."
"Accessory to his murder?" I asked.
"Not necessarily; but strongly accessory to his wrongdoing in the matterof treason. I think she, for a time, worked Gately through Rodman, but,latterly, she grew bolder or found she could do more by personal visitsand she came and went by the secret elevator, pretty much as she chose."
"I hate to have Miss Raynor know this," I said with a covert glance atRivers, to see how he took the remark.
"So do I," he said, as frankly as a boy; "I may as well tell you, Brice,that I love that girl. She is, to me, the very crown of womanhood. I haveworshiped her from the first moment I saw her. But, understand, I have nohopes,--no aspirations. I shall never offer my hand and heart to anywoman while I have no name to offer. And I shall never have a name. If Ihaven't yet discovered my own identity I never can. No, I'm no pessimist,and I know that some time some sudden shock might restore my memory allin a minute, yet I can't bank on such a possibility. I've talked thisover with Rankin,--he's the doctor who's following up my case,--time andagain. He says that a sudden and very forcible shock is needed to restoremy memory, and that it may come and--it may not. He says it can't beforced or brought about knowingly,--it will have to be a coincidence,--ahappening that will jar the inert cells of my brain--or, something likethat,--I don't remember the scientific terms."
Rivers passed his hand wearily across his forehead.
I was in a quandary. I had gone to see the man with full purpose ofluring him to Gately's office and confronting him with the sketchedsnowflake on the blotting-pad. Now, since he had confided to me his lovefor Olive Raynor, I shrank from doing anything that might prove him to beAmos Gately's murderer. For I was fond of Miss Raynor, in a deeplyrespectful and unpresumptuous fashion. And I had noticed several thingsof late that made me feel pretty sure that her friendship for Rivers wastrue and deep, if indeed it were not something more than friendship.This, to be sure, would argue but a fickle loyalty to the memory of AmoryManning, but as Norah and I agreed, when talking it over, Miss Raynor hadnever shown any desperate grief at Manning's disappearance,--at least,not more than the loss of a casual friend might arouse.
But I knew where my duty lay. And so I said, "Rivers, I wish you'd goround to Mr. Gately's office with me. Don't you think that if you werethere,--and you never have been,--you might chance upon some clew thathas escaped the notice of Wise or Hudson or myself?"
"Righto!" he said; "I've thought myself I'd like to go there. Not, as youpolitely suggest, to find overlooked clews, but just as a matter ofgeneral interest. I'm out, you know, to find the murderer, and also totrace the vanished Amory Manning."