The Girl at Central Read online

  VII

  The Doctor was as calm and matter-of-fact as if he were giving a lectureto a class of students. He looked much better than he did that morningin the Exchange; rested and with a good color. As he settled himself inthe chair, I heard one of the reporters whisper:

  "I wouldn't call that the mug of a murderer."

  I looked over my shoulder right at the one who had spoken, a young chapwith a round, rosy, innocent sort of face like a kid's and yellow hairstanding up over his head as thick as sheep's wool. I'd seen him severaltimes in the Exchange and knew his name was Babbitts and that the otherfellows called him "Soapy." When he caught my eye he winked, and youcouldn't be mad because it was like a big pink baby winking at you.

  The Doctor told his story more straight and continuous than any of theothers. It went along so clear from point to point, that the coronerdidn't have to ask so many questions, and when he did the doctor wasalways ready with his answer. It sounded to me as if he'd thought outevery detail, worked it up just right to get the best effect. He beganwith Saturday morning, when he'd got the call to go to the Dalzells'.

  "An operation was performed early that afternoon and I stayed during thenight and all the next day, going out on Sunday morning at ten for anhour's ride in my motor. I had decided to remain Sunday nighttoo--though the patient was out of danger--when at about eight Ireceived a telephone message from my wife saying Miss Hesketh had runaway with Jack Reddy. Hearing from her that their route would be by theturnpike to Bloomington I made up my mind that my best course was tostrike the turnpike and intercept them."

  "You disapproved of their marriage?"

  "Decidedly. Miss Hesketh was too young to know her own mind. Mr. Reddywas not the husband I would have chosen for her--not to mention thedistress it would have caused Mrs. Fowler to have her daughter marry inthat manner. My desire to keep the escapade secret made me tell Mrs.Dalzell a falsehood--that I was called away on an important case.

  "The Dalzells' chauffeur told me that the road from their place to theturnpike was impassable for motors. The best route for me would be to goto the Junction, where I could strike the Riven Rock Road, which cameout on the turnpike about a mile from Cresset's Crossing. I had plentyof time, as the distance young Reddy would have to travel before hereached that point was nearly a hundred and twenty miles.

  "I arrived at the Junction as the train for Philadelphia was drawingout. I spoke to Clark, the station agent, about the road, and, aftergetting the directions, walked round the depot to the back platform,where my car stood. As I passed the door of the waiting-room it suddenlyopened and a woman came out."

  He stopped--just for a moment--as if to let the people get the effect ofhis words. A rustle went over the room, but he looked as if he didn'tnotice it and went on as calm and natural as if he was telling us afiction story.

  "I probably wouldn't have noticed her if she hadn't given a suppressedcry and cowered back in the doorway. That made me look at her and, to myamazement, I saw it was Miss Hesketh's maid, Virginie Dupont."

  Nobody expected it. If he'd wanted to spring a sensation he'd done it.We were all leaning forward with our mouths open.

  "The moment I saw her I remembered that my wife had told me the womanhad gone with Miss Hesketh. One glance into the waiting-room told me shewas alone and I turned on her and told her I knew of the elopement andasked her what she was doing there. She was evidently terrified by myunexpected appearance, but seeing she was caught, she confessed that sheknew all about it, in fact, that she had been instructed by Miss Heskethto go to Philadelphia by the branch line, take a room in theBellevue-Stratford, and wait there till her mistress appeared.

  "I was enraged and let her see it, pushing her round to the car andordering her into the back seat. I vaguely noticed that she carried abag and wrap over her arm. She tried to excuse herself but I shut her upand took my seat at the wheel. There was no one on the platform as wewent out.

  "It took me over an hour to negotiate the distance between the Junctionand the turnpike. The road was in a fearful condition. We ran into chuckholes and through water nearly to the hubs. Once the right front wheeldropping into a washout, the lamp struck a stump and was so shattered ithad to be put out. My attention was concentrated on the path, especiallyafter we left the open country and entered a thick wood, where, with onelamp out of commission, I had to almost feel my way.

  "I said not a word to the woman nor she to me. It was not till I wasonce again in the open that I turned to speak to her and saw she wasgone."

  "Gone!" said one of the jury--a raw-boned, bearded old man like afarmer--so interested, he spoke right out.

  "Yes, gone. I guessed in a moment what she had done. Either when I hadstopped to put out the lamp or in one of the pauses while I was feelingmy way through the wood she had slipped out and run. It would have beeneasy for her to hide in the dark of the trees. I glanced into thetonneau and saw that the things she had carried, the bag and the wrap,were also missing. She had been frightened and made her escape.Unfortunately, in the shock and horror of the next day the whole matterslipped my mind and she had time to complete her getaway, probably bythe branch line early Sunday morning."

  The Coroner here explained that inquiries had since been made at thebranch line stations for the woman but nobody had been found who hadseen her.

  "I had no time to go back and look for her, and, anyway, it would havebeen useless, as she could have hidden from a sheriff's posse in thewood. Besides, my whole interest was focused on reaching the turnpike. Icould see it before me, a long winding line between the dark edges ofsmall trees. I turned into it and let the car out. Though the road hasmany turns I could have seen the lamps of a motor some distance aheadand I ran fast, looking neither to the right nor left but watching forapproaching lights. On my ride back I met only a few vehicles, severalfarmers' wagons and the car of Dr. Pease, the Longwood practitioner.

  "I reached home about two and went at once to my wife's room. She was ina hysterical state and I stayed with her an hour or so trying to quiether. When she was better I retired to my own apartment and at sevencalled up Walter Mills, a detective in New York, telling him to come toLongwood as soon as he could. By this time I was uneasy, not that I hadany suspicion of a real tragedy, but the disappearance of Miss Heskethalarmed me. I met Mills at the train and told him the situation and thatI intended telephoning to Fiske at Bloomington, thinking they might havereached there by some other way. It was his suggestion that before anystep was taken which might make the matter public, it would be well tocommunicate with Firehill and see if the servants knew anything. I didthis and to my amazement learned that Reddy was there."

  That is all of the Doctor's testimony that I need put down as the restof it you know.

  It left us in a sort of mixed-up surprise. No one could have told itbetter, no one could have been more sure about it or more quiet andnatural. _But_--it seems like I ought to write that word in the biggestletters to give the idea of how it stood out in my mind.

  Of all the stories it was the strangest and it was so _awfully_ pat. Idon't know how you feel about it, reading it as I've written it here,but I can say for myself, listening and watching that man tell it, Icouldn't seem to believe it.

  It was near to evening, the room getting dusk and the fire showing uplarge and bright when the jury brought in their verdict: "The deceasedmet her death at the hands of a person or persons unknown."

  I walked back up Maple Lane. The night was setting in cold and frosty.The clouds had drawn off, the air was clear as crystal and full of thesounds of motor horns. Big and little cars passed me, jouncing over theruts and swinging round the bend where the pine stood. I was looking upat it, black like a skeleton against the glow in the West, when a stepcame up behind me and a voice said:

  "You're a good witness, Miss Morganthau."

  It was that fresh kid Babbitts and I wasn't sorry to have him join me asI was feeling as if I'd been sitting in a tomb. He was serious too, nota wink about him now, his eyes
on the ground, his hands dug down in thepockets of his overcoat.

  "A strange case, isn't it?" he said.

  "Awful strange," I answered.

  "If it wasn't for your story of that man on the 'phone I think they'darrest Dr. Fowler to-night."

  "Didn't you believe what he said?"

  I wasn't going to give away my thoughts any more than I'd been willingto give away what I heard on the wire. And it seemed that he was thesame, for he answered slow and thoughtful:

  "I'm not saying what I believe or don't believe, or maybe it's better ifI say I'm not ready yet to believe or disbelieve anything,"--then helooked up at the sky, red behind the trees, and spoke easy and careless:"They say Miss Hesketh had a good many admirers."

  "Do they?" was all he got out of me.

  That made him laugh, jolly and boyish.

  "Oh, you needn't keep your guard up now. Your stuff'll be in the papersto-morrow, and, take it from me, that fellow that sent the message isgoing to get a jar."

  "The man I listened to?"

  "Sure. He hasn't got the ghost of an idea anyone overheard him. Can'tyou imagine how he'll feel when he opens his paper and sees that a smartlittle hello girl was tapping the wire?"

  It's funny, but I'd never thought of it that way. Why, he'd get a shocklike dynamite! It got hold of me so that I didn't speak for a spell,thinking of that man reading his paper to-morrow--over his coffee ormaybe going down in the L--and suddenly seeing printed out in black andwhite what he thought no one in the world knew except himself and thatpoor dead girl. Babbitts went on talking, me listening with oneear--which comes natural to an operator.

  "We've been rounding up all the men that were after her--not that theywere backward with their alibis--only too glad to be of service, thankyou! Carisbrook was at Aiken, a lawyer named Dunham was up state tryinga case; Robinson, a chap in a bank, was spending the week-end on LongIsland. There was only one of them near here--man named Cokesbury. Doyou know him?"

  Both my ears got busy.

  "Cokesbury," I said, sort of startled, "was Cokesbury at the Lodge lastweek?"

  "He was and I know just what he did."

  "What did he do?"

  He laughed out as gay as you please, for he saw he'd got me just wherehe wanted.

  "When I've tried to find out things from you you've turned me down."

  "Aw, go on," I said coaxing, "don't you know by experience I'm notalking machine to give out every word that's said to me."

  "I believe you," he answered, "and it'll be good for your character forme to set a generous example. Cokesbury was at the Lodge from lastSaturday on the one-ten train to last Monday on the eight-twenty."

  "Gee!" I said, soft to myself.

  "You can quell those rising hopes," he replied. "He wasn't the man youheard."

  "How do you know?"

  "Because hearing that he was a friend of Miss Hesketh's, I spent part ofyesterday at Azalea and found that Mr. Cokesbury can prove as good analibi as any of them."

  "Did you see him?"

  "No, he wasn't there and if he had been I wouldn't have bothered withhim. I saw someone much better--Miner, the man who owns the AzaleaGarage, where Cokesbury puts up his car. It appears that the trip beforelast Cokesbury broke his axle and had to have his car towed down to thegarage and left there to be mended. When he came down Saturday heexpected it to be done and when it wasn't, got in a rage and raised thedevil of a row. He had to go out to his place in one of Miner's carswhich left him there and went back for him Monday morning."

  "Then he had no auto on Sunday."

  "Miss Morganthau will take the head of the class," then he said, low, asif to someone beside him: "She's our prize pupil but we don't say itbefore her face for fear of making her proud," then back to me as solemnas a priest in the pulpit, "That is the situation reduced to its lowestterms--he had no car."

  "Well that ends _him_," I said.

  "So it seems to me. In fact Cokesbury gets the gate. I won't hide fromyou now that I went to Azalea because I'd heard a rumor of that talk onthe phone and thought I'd do a little private sleuthing on my own.Didn't know but what I was destined to be the Baby Grand Burns."

  "And nothing's come of it."

  "Nothing, except that it drops Cokesbury out with a thud that's dull andsickening for me, but you can bet your best hat it's just the oppositefor him."

  "Well, I guess yes," I said and walked along wondering to myself whosevoice that _could_ have been.