The Winning Clue Part 6

The lame man reflected, a forefinger against the right side of his nose, the att.i.tude emphasizing the fact that this feature was perceptibly crooked, bent toward the left.

"No," he concluded. "We'd probably be too late." Then he added, "And we didn't find out Morley's employment or profession in Was.h.i.+ngton--but we can do that later."

The chief of police prepared to leave, saying he was going to call at Douglas Campbell's office and from there go to headquarters in the hope that Perry had been found.

"Can't you come with me?" he invited.

"It's against the doctor's orders," Bristow replied. "He tells me not to leave this house or its porches. If I started to run around with you, I'd be exhausted in an hour. But I'll tell you what: this afternoon, after you've talked to Campbell and the darky, suppose you come back here, and we'll drop down to interview Miss Fulton ourselves."

This surprised Greenleaf.

"You mean you suspect----"

Bristow laughed.

"Oh," he countered lightly, "we've enough suspecting to do already.

There's Perry--and there's Morley. Don't let's complicate it too much.

But what Miss Fulton has to say may be valuable. By the way, if I should need to do so, how can I persuade anybody that I have authority to ask questions, or to do anything else in this matter?"

The captain thought a moment.

"I'll appoint you to the plain-clothes squad. I appoint you now, and the city commissioners will confirm it. They meet tonight. You're on the force--at a nominal salary--say ten dollars a week. That suit you?"

"Perfectly," consented Bristow. "What I want is the power to help in case I have the opportunity."

Greenleaf went out to the porch, followed by Bristow, and started down the steps.

"By the way," his new employee said in a cautious tone, "don't forget to stop at Number Five and look for those scratches, on the fingers and the neck."

"By cracky!" exclaimed the chief. "I'd forgotten all about it. I'll do that right away."

Looking toward No. 5, Bristow saw a hea.r.s.e-like wagon drawing up in front of the door. The coroner had already made arrangements for the removal of the body of Mrs. Withers to an undertaking establishment.

The lame man went slowly into the house and stood at the window, staring at the mountains. In the clear, newly washed air, they looked like the soft, tumbling waves of some magically blue sea.

Like most retiring, secluded men, he had his vanity in p.r.o.nounced degree.

He saw himself now, the dominant figure in this city of thirty thousand people, the man who had been selected by the chief of police as the one able to unravel the web of mystery surrounding this startling murder. The thought pleased him, and he smiled. He began to think about himself and about life as a general proposition.

Everything was always so mixed up, so involved. People talked of a divine providence, of the law that virtue is rewarded, of the rule that to do good is to have good done to one. He smiled again. If all that was true, what explanation was there for the murder of this woman, this beauty whose good nature, kindness, and cleverness had endeared her to all with whom she came in contact?

He had heard the women on the porch of No. 5 say that everybody had loved her. Why, then, had some ignorant negro or some white man bent on robbery been permitted to steal up on her in the dead of night and crush out her life? Was there any reason, any logic, any mercy in that?

He drummed on the window-pane with his fingertips and whistled, scarcely audibly, a fragment of tune. His pursed up mouth made it clear that he was not a handsome man--the lower lip was heavy, somewhat protuberant.

Pshaw! There was only one rule of life that held good, so far as he had been able to see. Strength and persistence accomplished things and brought success and security. Weakness and foolish prating about righteousness and virtue were never worth a dollar.

That was it! If you were mighty and clever, you stayed on top. If you were sentimental and looking after other people's interests, you went down. You had no time to bother about the safety and happiness of others.

Look out for yourself. Never relent in the fierce battle against the odds of life. That was the only way to conquer and avoid catastrophe.

He was sure of it when he thought about himself. He had a brilliant brain. It was not particularly egotistic for him to think that. It was merely a fact. But he had not used it relentlessly and incessantly.

He had relaxed his hold too often when seeking pleasure. Although he had done things which had been applauded by his friends, he had nothing much to show in the way of lasting results.

That was why he was here now, with scarcely enough resources to pay the rent of his bungalow and the expenses of living. A little dabbling in real estate, some third-rate work for the magazines, a pa.s.sing notoriety as a guesser of crime riddles--it was not a record that promised a bright future.

He sighed. Well, that was the way of life. He might yet accomplish big things although he was under a terrific handicap--and he might not. He would try, and see.

His future was much like the probable outcome of this murder. How would the circ.u.mstances shape themselves? What would be the result of circ.u.mstantial evidence?

It was all a gamble. Some murderers were lucky and got away. And some innocent men were not lucky. These were like the blundering, illiterate negro Perry. There was an even chance that the guilty man would be caught--and there was an even chance that an innocent man would hang.

Life was like that!

He caressed with his forefinger his protruding lip. He wouldn't say the negro was guilty. In spite of the evidence of the b.u.t.tons, he would advance no such theory yet. And as to Morley--n.o.body could think that a man with such a weak face would have the nerve to do murder. He knew this. There must be somebody else. It might be that the sister, Maria Fulton, in an excess of rage--But why reason about that before he had talked to her?

It was up to him to fasten the guilt on the guilty man--or woman. That was what was expected of him. And it was a task which----

He turned toward the table and began methodically to paste into their proper places the clippings he had cut from the newspapers concerning other "big" murder cases. He would study them later.

He looked up and saw a very fat man standing just outside the door.

"h.e.l.lo, Overton," he said, without cordiality, and joined him on the porch.

"I picked out an interesting time to visit you," observed the fat man, still puffing from the exertion of climbing the Manniston Road hill; "what with murder and----"

"And I'm going to be frank with you," Bristow put in. "I'm helping the police a little, and I haven't the time to gossip now. I know you'll understand----"

"Surely, surely!" said Overton. "I'll come some other time. This sort of stuff's right in your line. You used to be an authority on it in Cincinnati, I remember."

He said good-bye and lumbered awkwardly down the steps. He and Bristow had been good friends in Cincinnati, and he seemed now not at all offended by the summary dismissal.

The door leading from the kitchen to the dining room opened. Mattie had returned. Bristow reentered the house.

"Well?" he said in the low, kindly tone he used in speaking to her.

"I foun' Lucy Thomas, Mistuh Bristow," she said, breathless and indignant. "She is sho' one sorry n.i.g.g.e.r. She wuz drunk--layin' out in de parluh uv dat little house uv her'n. Dead drunk."

"Did you wake her up, Mattie?"

"Yas, suh; but she ain' fit to come do no wuk. Dis ole rotten blockade whisky dese n.i.g.g.e.rs drink jes' knocked her out--knocked her out fuh fair."

"Did she say when she got drunk?"

"Las' night, suh, late, wid dat Perry. You know, Mistuh Bristow; he been doin' some wuk fuh you."

"Was Perry drunk last night? Did she tell you?"

"He wuz a little lit up, she says, but he warn't drunk. She didn't have no idea whar he wuz jes' now."

Bristow made no comment on this, and Mattie, turning slowly away from him, began to mumble something.