The Girl at Central Page 8

  VIII

  After the inquest there was no more question about who was suspected. Itwas as if every finger in Longwood was raised and pointed to Mapleshade.The cautious people didn't say it plain--especially the shop-keepers whowere afraid of losing custom--but those who had nothing to gain bykeeping still came out with it flatfooted.

  It wasn't only that nobody liked the Doctor, or believed his story, itwas because the people were wild at what had been done. They wanted tofind the murderer and put him behind bars and seeing that things pointedmore clearly to Dr. Fowler than to anybody else they pitched on him. Allthe gossip about the quarreling came out blacker than ever. The paperswere full of it and the other worse stories, about Sylvia's allowanceand the will of her father. There wasn't a bit of dirty linen in theFowler household that wasn't washed and hung out on the line for thepublic to gape at, and some of it was dirtier when they'd got throughwashing than it had been before.

  There were those who didn't scruple to say that the whole tragedy was aframe-up between Virginie Dupont and the Doctor. If you talked sensibleto them and asked them how Virginie could have got word to him thatSylvia was running away, they'd just push that to one side, saying itcould be explained some way, everything wasn't known yet--but one thingyou _could_ be sure of--the one person who knew the whereabouts of thatFrench woman was Dr. Daniel Fowler.

  I believe there were some days after the inquest when, if there'd beenan anarchist or agitator to stand on the postoffice steps and yell thatDr. Fowler ought to be jailed, a crowd would have gathered, gone down toMapleshade, and demanded him.

  Fortunately there was no one of that kind around, and he stayed quiet inhis home, not even coming to the village. Two days after the inquest Isaw Anne and she said he and Mrs. Fowler hadn't been out of thehouse--that they were in a state of siege what with reporters and thepolice and morbid cranks who hung round the grounds looking up at thewindows.

  That same evening I stayed over time in the Exchange, lending a hand.The work was something awful, and Katie Reilly, the new girl, was mostsnowed under and on the way to lose her head. I wanted to see herthrough and I wanted the credit of the office kept up, but it's alsotrue that I wanted to be on the job myself and hear all that waspassing. Believe me, it was hard to quiet down in my bedroom at nightafter eight hours at the switchboard right in the thick of theexcitement. Besides, I'd got to know the reporters pretty well and itwas fun making them think I could give them leads and then guying them.

  I liked Babbitts the best, but there were three others that weren't badas men go. One was Jones, a tall thin chap like an actor, with longblack hair hanging down to his collar, and Freddy Jasper, who wasEnglish and talked with an awful swell dialect, and a sallow-skinned,consumpted-looking guy called Yerrington who belonged on a paper asyellow as his face and always went round with a cigarette hanging fromhis lip like it was stuck on with glue.

  It was nearly eight and work was slacking off when I started to go home.What with the jump I'd been on and listening to the gabbing round thedoor I'd forgotten my supper. It wasn't till I saw the Gilt Edge windowwith a nice pile of apples stacked up round a pumpkin, that I rememberedI was hungry and walked over. There were only three people in the place,Florrie Stein, the waitress, and a woman with a kid in the corner.

  I was just finishing my corn beef hash with a cup of coffee at my elbowand stewed prunes on the line of promotion when Soapy and Jones andJasper came in and asked me if they could sit at my table. "Pleaseyourself," said I, "and you'll please me," for politeness is one of thethings I was bred up to, and they sat down, calling out their orders toFlorrie Stein.

  They naturally began talking about "the case"--it was all anybody talkedabout just then--and for all I knew so much about it, I generally pickedup some new bits from them. So I went to the extravagance of three centsworth of jelly roll, not because I wanted it, but because I could crumbit up and eat it slow and not give away I was sitting on to listen.

  "We can talk before you, Miss Morganthau," said Babbitts, "because whilewe all agree you're the belle of Longwood, we've found out by sadexperience you're a belle without a tongue."

  Florrie Stein, bringing the food then, they were silent till she'd setit out, and when she'd drawn off to the cashier's desk, they started inagain. They were, so to speak, looking over Hines as a suspect.

  "No, Hines won't fit," said Babbitts. "The presence of the jewelry onthe body eliminates him. They've dug up his record and though the placehe ran wasn't to be recommended for Sunday school picnics, the manhimself seems to have been fairly decent."

  "It's odd about the bag--the fitted bag and the jewelry gone from theroom," said Jasper.

  "The police have an idea that Virginie Dupont could tell something ofthem."

  "Theft?"

  "Theft on the side."

  "Oh, pshaw!" said Jones, "what's the good of complicating things? Iftheft was committed it was a frame-up, part of a plot."

  "You believe in this idea they've got in the village that Fowler and theFrench woman worked together?"

  "I do--to my mind the murderer's marked as plain as Cain after he wasbranded on the brow or wherever it was."

  Then Jasper spoke up. He's a nice quiet chap, not as fresh as theothers. "Let's hear what you base that assertion on."

  Jones forgot his supper and twisted round sideways in his chair, lookingthoughtful up at the cornice:

  "As I understand it, in a murder two things are necessary--a crime and acorpse; and in a murderer one, a motive. Now we have all three--themotive especially strong. If Miss Hesketh married, her stepfather losthis home and the money he had been living on, so he tried to stop herfrom marrying. Saturday night he heard that his efforts had failed. Ifancy that on Sunday morning when he went for that auto drive he stoppedat some village--not as yet located--and communicated with VirginieDupont, who was in his pay. She, too, went out that morning, you mayremember."

  "There's a good deal of surmise about this," said Babbitts.

  Jones gave him a scornful look.

  "If the links in the chain were perfect Dr. Fowler'd be eating hisdinner to-night in Bloomington Jail."

  "How do you account for Miss Hesketh--presupposing it was she--being onthe train instead of the turnpike?" said Jasper.

  "A change of plans," Jones answered calmly, "also not yet satisfactorilycleared up. To continue: Sometime on Sunday the Doctor conceived theplan of ridding himself of all his cares--his troublesome stepdaughter,the disturbance of his home and his financial distress. _How_," heturned and looked solemnly at us, fate played so well into his hands Ican't yet explain--the main point is that it did. He met Miss Hesketh atthe Junction, either by threats, persuasion or coercion made her enterhis auto and carried her up the road to the turnpike.

  "And now," said Babbitts, leaning his arms on the table, "we come to herappearance in the Wayside Arbor."

  "We do," Jones replied, nodding his head. "You may remember that bothHines and his servant said there were twigs and leaves on the edge ofher skirt and that her boots were muddy. Traces of this were stillvisible in her clothes when they found her body. She _did_ get out ofthe automobile, but not so far from the turnpike as he said. Either heand she had some fierce quarrel and she ran from him in rage or terror,or he may have told the truth and she slipped out at the turn from theRiven Rock Road without his knowledge. Anyway she got away from him andran for the only light she saw. There she telephoned Reddy, withholdingthe main facts from him, perhaps merely to save time, but cautioning himagainst letting anyone know of the message. That, as I see it, was anatural feminine desire to guard against gossip. When she thought Reddywas due she started out to meet him--and instead met the Doctor."

  "Who'd been hanging about for a half-hour on the roadside?"

  "Precisely. He killed her, concealed the body, and went home."

  "Just a minute," said Yerrington--"what did he kill her with? The weaponused is a disputed point. Many think it was a farm implement. Did he goacross lots to Cresset's an
d arm himself with a convenient spade or rakefor the fatherly purpose of slaying his stepdaughter?"

  But you couldn't phase Jones, he said as calm as a May morning:

  "He _could_ have done that. But I don't think he did. He didn't need it.The tool box of the car was nearer to hand. A large-sized auto wrench isa pretty formidable weapon, and a tire wrench--did you ever see one? Onewell-aimed blow of that would crush in the head of a negro."

  "Gentlemen, the evidence is all in," said Babbitts.

  "Your case might hold water," said Jasper, "if it wasn't as full ofholes as a sieve. Why, you can make out as good a one for almostanybody."

  "Who, for example?" Jones asked.

  "Well--take Reddy."

  "Jack Reddy?" I said that, sitting up suddenly and staring at them witha piece of jelly roll halfway to my mouth.

  "He's as good as another," said Jasper, and then he added sort ofdreamy: "I believe I could work up quite a convincing case againstReddy, allowing for a hole here and there. But our illustrious friendhere admits holes at this stage."

  "Fire away," said Babbitts. "Give it to us, holes and all."

  "Well--off the bat here it is. You may remember that no one saw himcoming back from Maple Lane that night. There is no one, therefore, todeny that he may have had Miss Hesketh in the car with him. Instead ofgoing back to Firehill, as he says he did, he followed his original planof taking her by the turnpike."

  "Right at the start I challenge that," said Babbitts. "She appeared atthe Wayside Arbor at nine-thirty. The date in Maple Lane was for seven.Supposing she kept it and was on time--which is a stretch of theimagination--he would have had to travel one hundred and eighteen milesin two hours and a half."

  "He could have done it."

  "On a black, dark night? nearly forty-eight miles an hour?"

  "You forget he knew the road and was driving a high-powered racing car.It's improbable but not impossible."

  "I count that as a hole, but go on."

  "Now in this hypothetical case we'll suppose that as that car flew overthe miles the man and the woman in it had high words?"

  "Hold on," said Jones, holding out his fork--"that's too big a hole.They were lovers eloping, not an old married couple."

  "I'll explain that later. The high words inflamed and enraged the man tothe point of murder and he conceived a horrible plan. As they neared theWayside Arbor he told the woman something was wrong with the car andsent her to the place ostensibly to telephone, really to establish herpresence there at a time when, had she been with him, she could hardlyhave got that far."

  I jumped in there. I knew it was only fooling, but even so I didn't likehearing Mr. Reddy talked about that way.

  "Who did he send her to telephone to, Mr. Jasper--himself?"

  Babbitts laughed and jerked his head toward me.

  "Listen to our little belle sounding the curfew on Jasper."

  But Mr. Jasper was ready.

  "He could have done that, knowing his house was empty. Hines, youremember, said she wasn't five minutes in the booth. We've only Reddy'sword for that message. We don't even know if she got a connection. Itelephoned out to the Corona operator Saturday and she answered thatthere was no record of the message and she herself remembered nothingabout it."

  "But Sylvia," I said--"she told Hines she was expecting someone to comefor her."

  "Sylvia was eloping. Mightn't she have told Hines--who was curious andintrusive--what wasn't true?"

  A sort of hush fell on us all. Babbitts's face and Jones's, from beingjust amused, were intent and interested.

  "Go ahead, Jasper," said Babbitts, "if this isn't buying the baby afrock it's good yarning."

  Jasper went on.

  "Her story of the broken automobile _she_ believed to be true. But shedidn't want Hines to know who she was or what she was up to, so sheinvented the person coming to take her home. Why she sat so long theretalking is--I'll admit--a hole, but I said in the beginning there wouldbe some. The end is just like the end of Jones's case. She went back toReddy and he killed her with, as our friend has suggested, one of theauto tools. Very soon after it would have been as that Bohemian--what'sher name?--heard the scream at ten-ten."

  "That's all very well," said Jones, "but before we go further I'd likeyou to furnish us with a motive."

  "Nothing easier--jealousy."

  "Jealousy!" I said, sudden and sharp.

  "Jealousy in its most violent form. The lady in this case was a peculiartype--a natural born siren. She had made the man jealous, furiouslyjealous. _That_ was the reason of the high words in the motor."

  "Who was he jealous of?" It was I again who asked that.

  Jasper turned round and looked at me with a smile.

  "Why, Miss Morganthau," he said, "_you_ gave us the clue to that. He wasjealous of the man who made the date you heard on the phone. Don't yousee," he said, turning to the others, "_that_ man kept his date andReddy came and found him there."

  I can't tell what it was that fell on us and made us sit so still for aminute. All of us knew it was just a joke, but--for me, anyway--it wasas if a cloud had settled on the room. Babbitts sat smoking a cigaretteand staring at the rings he was making with his eyes screwed up.Presently, when Jones spoke, his voice had a sound like his pride wastaken down.

  "A great deal better than I expected, but it's simply riddled withholes."

  Before Jasper could answer the door opened and Yerrington came in. Thecigarette was hanging off his lip and as he said "Good evening" to me itwobbled but clung on. Then he pulled out a chair, sat down and, lookingat the other three with a gleam in his eye, said:

  "A little while ago Dr. Fowler's chauffeur in dusting out his car foundthe gold mesh purse squeezed down between the back and the cushion."