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Anna Katharine Green >> Initials Only
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But Mr. Gryce, who discerned tidings in the bereaved father's face,
was all alacrity in an instant. Greeting his visitor with a smile
which few could see without trusting the man, he explained the
inspector's absence and introduced himself in his own capacity.
Mr. Challoner had heard of him. Nevertheless, he did not seem
inclined to speak.
Mr. Gryce motioned Sweetwater from the room. With a woeful look the
young detective withdrew, his last glance cast at the cutter still
lying in full view on the table.
Mr. Gryce, not unmindful himself of this object, took it up, then
laid it down again, with an air of seeming abstraction.
The father's attention was caught.
"What is that?" he cried, advancing a step and bestowing more than
an ordinary glance at the object thus brought casually, as it were,
to his notice. "I surely recognise this cutter. Does it belong
here or--"
Mr. Gryce, observing the other's emotion, motioned him to a chair.
As his visitor sank into it, he remarked, with all the consideration
exacted by the situation:
"It is unknown property, Mr. Challoner. But we have some reason to
think it belonged to your daughter. Are we correct in this surmise?"
"I have seen it, or one like it, often in her hand." Here his eyes
suddenly dilated and the hand stretched forth to grasp it quickly
drew back. "Where--where was it found?" he hoarsely demanded. "O
God! am I to be crushed to the very earth by sorrow!"
Mr. Gryce hastened to give him such relief as was consistent with
the truth.
"It was picked up--last night--from the lobby floor. There is
seemingly nothing to connect it with her death. Yet--"
The pause was eloquent. Mr. Challoner gave the detective an agonised
look and turned white to the lips. Then gradually, as the silence
continued, his head fell forward, and he muttered almost
unintelligibly:
"I honestly believe her the victim of some heartless stranger. I
do now; but--but I cannot mislead the police. At any cost I must
retract a statement I made under false impressions and with no
desire to deceive. I said that I knew all of the gentlemen who
admired her and aspired to her hand, and that they were all reputable
men and above committing a crime of this or any other kind. But it
seems that I did not know her secret heart as thoroughly as I had
supposed. Among her effects I have just come upon a batch of letters
--love letters I am forced to acknowledge--signed by initials
totally strange to me. The letters are manly in tone--most of them
--but one--"
"What about the one?"
"Shows that the writer was displeased. It may mean nothing, but I
could not let the matter go without setting myself right with the
authorities. If it might be allowed to rest here--if those letters
can remain sacred, it would save me the additional pang of seeing
her inmost concerns--the secret and holiest recesses of a woman's
heart, laid open to the public. For, from the tenor of most of these
letters, she--she was not averse to the writer."
Mr. Gryce moved a little restlessly in his chair and stared hard at
the cutter so conveniently placed under his eye. Then his manner
softened and he remarked:
"We will do what we can. But you must understand that the matter is
not a simple one. That, in fact, it contains mysteries which demand
police investigation. We do not dare to trifle with any of the facts.
The inspector, and, if not he, the coroner, will have to be told about
these letters and will probably ask to see them."
"They are the letters of a gentleman."
"With the one exception."
"Yes, that is understood." Then in a sudden heat and with an almost
sublime trust in his daughter notwithstanding the duplicity he had
just discovered:
"Nothing--not the story told by these letters, or the sight of
that sturdy paper-cutter with its long and very slender blade, will
make me believe that she willingly took her own life. You do not
know, cannot know, the rare delicacy of her nature. She was a lady
through and through. If she had meditated death--if the breach
suggested by the one letter I have mentioned, should have so preyed
upon her spirits as to lead her to break her old father's heart
and outrage the feelings of all who knew her, she could not, being
the woman she was, choose a public place for such an act--an hotel
writing-room--in face of a lobby full of hurrying men. It was out
of nature. Every one who knows her will tell you so. The deed was
an accident--incredible--but still an accident."
Mr. Gryce had respect for this outburst. Making no attempt to answer
it, he suggested, with some hesitation, that Miss Challoner had been
seen writing a letter previous to taking those fatal steps from the
desk which ended so tragically. Was this letter to one of her lady
friends, as reported, and was it as far from suggesting the awful
tragedy which followed, as he had been told?
"It was a cheerful letter. Such a one as she often wrote to her
little protegees here and there. I judge that this was written to
some girl like that, for the person addressed was not known to her
maid, any more than she was to me. It expressed an affectionate
interest, and it breathed encouragement--encouragement! and she
meditating her own death at the moment! Impossible! That letter
should exonerate her if nothing else does."
Mr. Gryce recalled the incongruities, the inconsistencies and even
the surprising contradictions which had often marked the conduct of
men and women, in his lengthy experience with the strange, the
sudden, and the tragic things of life, and slightly shook his head.
He pitied Mr. Challoner, and admired even more his courage in face
of the appalling grief which had overwhelmed him, but he dared not
encourage a false hope. The girl had killed herself and with this
weapon. They might not be able to prove it absolutely, but it was
nevertheless true, and this broken old man would some day be obliged
to acknowledge it. But the detective said nothing of this, and was
very patient with the further arguments the other advanced to prove
his point and the lofty character of the girl to whom, misled by
appearance, the police seemed inclined to attribute the awful sin
of self-destruction.
But when, this topic exhausted, Mr. Challoner rose to leave the
room, Mr. Gryce showed where his own thoughts still centred, by
asking him the date of the correspondence discovered between his
daughter and her unknown admirer.
"Some of the letters were dated last summer, some this fall. The
one you are most anxious to hear about only a month back," he
added, with unconquerable devotion to what he considered his duty.
Mr. Gryce would like to have carried his inquiries further, but
desisted. His heart was full of compassion for this childless old
man, doomed to have his choicest memories disturbed by cruel doubts
which possibly would never be removed to his own complete
satisfaction.
But when he was gone, and Sweetwater had returned, Mr. Gryce made
it his first duty to communicate to his superiors the hitherto
unsuspected fact of a secret romance in Miss Challoner's seemingly
calm and well-guarded life. She had loved and been loved by one
of whom her family knew nothing. And the two had quarrelled, as
certain letters lately found could be made to show.
VII
THE LETTERS
Before a table strewn with papers, in the room we have already
mentioned as given over to the use of the police, sat Dr. Heath in
a mood too thoughtful to notice the entrance of Mr. Gryce and
Sweetwater from the dining-room where they had been having dinner.
However as the former's tread was somewhat lumbering, the coroner's
attention was caught before they had quite crossed the room, and
Sweetwater, with his quick eye, noted how his arm and hand
immediately fell so as to cover up a portion of the papers lying
nearest to him.
"Well, Gryce, this is a dark case," he observed, as at his bidding
the two detectives took their seats.
Mr. Gryce nodded; so did Sweetwater.
"The darkest that has ever come to my knowledge," pursued the
coroner.
Mr. Gryce again nodded; but not so, Sweetwater. For some reason
this simple expression of opinion seemed to have given him a mental
start.
"She was not shot. She was not struck by any other hand; yet she
lies dead from a mortal wound in the breast. Though there is no
tangible proof of her having inflicted this wound upon herself, the
jury will have no alternative, I fear, than to pronounce the case
one of suicide."
"I'm sorry that I've been able to do so little," remarked Mr. Gryce.
The coroner darted him a quick look.
"You are not satisfied? You have some different idea?" he asked.
The detective frowned at his hands crossed over the top of his cane,
then shaking his head, replied:
"The verdict you mention is the only natural one, of course. I
see that you have been talking with Miss Challoner's former maid?"
"Yes, and she has settled an important point for us. There was a
possibility, of course, that the paper-cutter which you brought to
my notice had never gone with her into the mezzanine. That she,
or some other person, had dropped it in passing through the lobby.
But this girl assures me that her mistress did not enter the lobby
that night. That she accompanied her down in the elevator, and saw
her step off at the mezzanine. She can also swear that the cutter
was in a book she carried--the book we found lying on the desk.
The girl remembers distinctly seeing its peculiarly chased handle
projecting from its pages. Could anything be more satisfactory if
--I was going to say, if the young lady had been of the impulsive
type and the provocation greater. But Miss Challoner's nature was
calm, and were it not for these letters--" here his arm shifted a
little--"I should not be so sure of my jury's future verdict.
Love--" he went on, after a moment of silent consideration of a
letter he had chosen from those before him, "disturbs the most
equable natures. When it enters as a factor, we can expect anything
--as you know. And Miss Challoner evidently was much attached to
her correspondent, and naturally felt the reproach conveyed in
these lines."
And Dr. Heath read:
"Dear Miss Challoner:
"Only a man of small spirit could endure what I endured from you
the other day. Love such as mine would be respectable in a
clod-hopper, and I think that even you will acknowledge that I
stand somewhat higher than that. Though I was silent under your
disapprobation, you shall yet have your answer. It will not lack
point because of its necessary delay."
"A threat!"
The words sprang from Sweetwater, and were evidently involuntary.
Dr. Heath paid no notice, but Mr. Gryce, in shifting his hands on
his cane top, gave them a sidelong look which was not without a
hint of fresh interest in a case concerning which he had believed
himself to have said his last word.
"It is the only letter of them all which conveys anything like a
reproach," proceeded the coroner. "The rest are ardent enough and,
I must acknowledge that, so far as I have allowed myself to look
into them, sufficiently respectful. Her surprise must consequently
have been great at receiving these lines, and her resentment equally
so. If the two met afterwards--But I have not shown you the
signature. To the poor father it conveyed nothing--some facts have
been kept from him--but to us--" here he whirled the letter about
so that Sweetwater, at least, could see the name, "it conveys a
hope that we may yet understand Miss Challoner."
"Brotherson!" exclaimed the young detective in loud surprise.
"Brotherson! The man who--"
"The man who left this building just before or simultaneously with
the alarm caused by Miss Challoner's fall. It clears away some of
the clouds befogging us. She probably caught sight of him in the
lobby, and in the passion of the moment forgot her usual instincts
and drove the sharp-pointed weapon into her heart."
"Brotherson!" The word came softly now, and with a thoughtful
intonation. "He saw her die."
"Why do you say that?"
"Would he have washed his hands in the snow if he had been in
ignorance of the occurrence? He was the real, if not active, cause
of her death and he knew it. Either he--Excuse me, Dr. Heath and
Mr. Gryce, it is not for me to obtrude my opinion."
"Have you settled it beyond dispute that Brotherson is really the
man who was seen doing this?"
"No, sir. I have not had a minute for that job, but I'm ready for
the business any time you see fit to spare me."
"Let it be to-morrow, or, if you can manage it, to-night. We want
the man even if he is not the hero of that romantic episode. He
wrote these letters, and he must explain the last one. His initials,
as you see, are not ordinary ones, and you will find them at the
bottom of all these sheets. He was brave enough or arrogant enough
to sign the questionable one with his full name. This may speak
well for him, and it may not. It is for you to decide that. Where
will you look for him, Sweetwater? No one here knows his address."
"Not Miss Challoner's maid?"
"No; the name is a new one to her. But she made it very evident
that she was not surprised to hear that her mistress was in secret
correspondence with a member of the male sex. Much can be hidden
from servants, but not that."
"I'll find the man; I have a double reason for doing that now; he
shall not escape me."
Dr. Heath expressed his satisfaction, and gave some orders.
Meanwhile, Mr. Gryce had not uttered a word.
VIII
STRANGE DOINGS FOR GEORGE
That evening George sat so long over the newspapers that in spite
of my absorbing interest in the topic engrossing me, I fell asleep
in my cozy little rocking chair. I was awakened by what seemed
like a kiss falling very softly on my forehead, though, to be sure,
it may have been only the flap of George's coat sleeve as he stooped
over me.
"Wake up, little woman," I heard, "and trot away to bed. I'm going
out and may not be in till daybreak."
"You! going out! at ten o'clock at night, tired as you are--as we
both are! What has happened--Oh!"
This broken exclamation escaped me as I perceived in the dim
background by the sitting-room door, the figure of a man who called
up recent, but very thrilling experiences.
"Mr. Sweetwater," explained George. "We are going out together. It
is necessary, or you may be sure I should not leave you."
I was quite wide awake enough by now to understand. "Oh, I know.
You are going to hunt up the man. How I wish--"
But George did not wait for me to express my wishes. He gave me a
little good advice as to how I had better employ my time in his
absence, and was off before I could find words to answer.
This ends all I have to say about myself; but the events of that
night carefully related to me by George are important enough for me
to describe them, with all the detail which is their rightful due.
I shall tell the story as I have already been led to do in other
portions of this narrative, as though I were present and shared the
adventure.
As soon as the two were in the street, the detective turned towards
George and said:
"Mr. Anderson, I have a great deal to ask of you. The business
before us is not a simple one, and I fear that I shall have to
subject you to more inconvenience than is customary in matters like
this. Mr. Brotherson has vanished; that is, in his own proper
person, but I have an idea that I am on the track of one who will
lead us very directly to him if we manage the affair carefully.
What I want of you, of course, is mere identification. You saw the
face of the man who washed his hands in the snow, and would know it
again, you say. Do you think you could be quite sure of yourself,
if the man were differently dressed and differently occupied?"
"I think so. There's his height and a certain strong look in his
face. I cannot describe it."
"You don't need to. Come! we're all right. You don't mind making
a night of it?"
"Not if it is necessary."
"That we can't tell yet." And with a characteristic shrug and smile,
the detective led the way to a taxicab which stood in waiting at the
corner.
A quarter of an hour of rather fast riding brought them into a
tangle of streets on the East side. As George noticed the swarming
sidewalks and listened to the noises incident to an over-populated
quarter, he could not forbear, despite the injunction he had
received, to express his surprise at the direction of their search.
"Surely," said he, "the gentleman I have described can have no
friends here." Then, bethinking himself, he added: "But if he has
reasons to fear the law, naturally he would seek to lose himself in
a place as different as possible from his usual haunts."
"Yes, that would be some men's way," was the curt, almost
indifferent, answer he received. Sweetwater was looking this way
and that from the window beside him, and now, leaning out gave some
directions to the driver which altered their course.
When they stopped, which was in a few minutes, he said to George:
"We shall have to walk now for a block or two. I'm anxious to
attract no attention, nor is it desirable for you to do so. If you
can manage to act as if you were accustomed to the place and just
leave all the talking to me, we ought to get along first-rate.
Don't be astonished at anything you see, and trust me for the rest;
that's all."
They alighted, and he dismissed the taxicab. Some clock in the
neighbourhood struck the hour of ten. "Good! we shall be in time,"
muttered the detective, and led the way down the street and round
a corner or so, till they came to a block darker than the rest, and
much less noisy.
It had a sinister look, and George, who is brave enough under all
ordinary circumstances, was glad that his companion wore a badge
and carried a whistle. He was also relieved when he caught sight
of the burly form of a policeman in the shadow of one of the
doorways. Yet the houses he saw before him were not so very
different from those they had already passed. His uneasiness could
not have sprung from them. They had even an air of positive
respectability, as though inhabited by industrious workmen. Then,
what was it which made the close companionship of a member of the
police so uncommonly welcome? Was it a certain aspect of
solitariness which clung to the block, or was it the sudden
appearance here and there of strangely gliding figures, which no
sooner loomed up against the snowy perspective, than they
disappeared again in some unseen doorway?
"There's a meeting on to-night, of the Associated Brotherhood of
the Awl, the Plane and the Trowel (whatever that means), and it is
the speaker we want to see; the man who is to address them promptly
at ten o'clock. Do you object to meetings?"
"Is this a secret one?"
"It wasn't advertised."
"Are we carpenters or masons that we can count on admittance?"
"I am a carpenter. Don't you think you can be a mason for the
occasion?"
"I doubt it, but--"
"Hush! I must speak to this man."
George stood back, and a few words passed between Sweetwater and
a shadowy figure which seemed to have sprung up out of the sidewalk.
"Balked at the outset," were the encouraging words with which the
detective rejoined George. "It seems that a pass-word is necessary,
and my friend has been unable to get it. Will the speaker pass out
this way?" he inquired of the shadowy figure still lingering in
their rear.
"He didn't go in by it; yet I believe he's safe enough inside," was
the muttered answer.
Sweetwater had no relish for disappointments of this character, but
it was not long before he straightened up and allowed himself to
exchange a few more words with this mysterious person. These appeared
to be of a more encouraging nature than the last, for it was not long
before the detective returned with renewed alacrity to George, and,
wheeling him about, began to retrace his steps to the corner.
"Are we going back? Are you going to give up the job?" George asked.
"No; we're going to take him from the rear. There's a break in the
fence--Oh, we'll do very well. Trust me."
George laughed. He was growing excited, but not altogether agreeably
so. He says that he has seen moments of more pleasant anticipation.
Evidently, my good husband is not cut out for detective work.
Where they went under this officer's guidance, he cannot tell. The
tortuous tangle of alleys through which he now felt himself led was
dark as the nether regions to his unaccustomed eyes. There was snow
under his feet and now and then he brushed against some obtruding
object, or stumbled against a low fence; but beyond these slight
miscalculations on his own part, he was a mere automaton in the hands
of his eager guide, and only became his own man again when they
suddenly stepped into an open yard and he could discern plainly
before him the dark walls of a building pointed out by Sweetwater as
their probable destination. Yet even here they encountered some
impediment which prohibited a close approach. A wall or shed cut
off their view of the building's lower storey; and though somewhat
startled at being left unceremoniously alone after just a whispered
word of encouragement from the ever ready detective, George could
quite understand the necessity which that person must feel for a
quiet reconnoitering of the surroundings before the two of them
ventured further forward in their possibly hazardous undertaking.
Yet the experience was none too pleasing to George, and he was very
glad to hear Sweetwater's whisper again at his ear, and to feel
himself rescued from the pool of slush in which he had been left to
stand.
"The approach is not all that can be desired," remarked the detective
as they entered what appeared to be a low shed. "The broken board
has been put back and securely nailed in place, and if I am not
very much mistaken there is a fellow stationed in the yard who will
want the pass-word too. Looks shady to me. I'll have something to
tell the chief when I get back."
"But we! What are we going to do if we cannot get in front or rear?"
"We're going to wait right here in the hopes of catching a glimpse
of our man as he comes out," returned the detective, drawing George
towards a low window overlooking the yard he had described as
sentinelled. "He will have to pass directly under this window on
his way to the alley," Sweetwater went on to explain, "and if I can
only raise it--but the noise would give us away. I can't do that."
"Perhaps it swings on hinges," suggested George. "It looks like
that sort of a window."
"If it should--well! it does. We're in great luck, sir. But
before I pull it open, remember that from the moment I unlatch it,
everything said or done here can be heard in the adjoining yard.
So no whispers and no unnecessary movements. When you hear him
coming, as sooner or later you certainly will, fall carefully to
your knees and lean out just far enough to catch a glimpse of him
before he steps down from the porch. If he stops to light his cigar
or to pass a few words with some of the men he will leave behind,
you may get a plain enough view of his face or figure to identify
him. The light is burning low in that rear hall, but it will do.
If it does not,--if you can't see him or if you do, don't hang out
of the window more than a second. Duck after your first look. I
don't want to be caught at this job with no better opportunity for
escape than we have here. Can you remember all that?"
George pinched his arm encouragingly, and Sweetwater, with an
amused grunt, softly unlatched the window and pulled it wide open.
A fine sleet flew in, imperceptible save for the sensation of damp
it gave, and the slight haze it diffused through the air. Enlarged
by this haze, the building they were set to watch rose in magnified
proportions at their left. The yard between, piled high in the
centre with snow-heaps or other heaps covered with snow, could not
have been more than forty feet square. The window from which they
peered, was half-way down this yard, so that a comparatively short
distance separated them from the porch where George had been told
to look for the man he was expected to identify. All was dark there
at present, but he could hear from time to time some sounds of
restless movement, as the guard posted inside shifted in his narrow
quarters, or struck his benumbed feet softly together.
But what came to them from above was more interesting than anything
to be heard or seen below. A man's voice, raised to a wonderful
pitch by the passion of oratory, had burst the barriers of the
closed hall in that towering third storey and was carrying its tale
to other ears than those within. Had it been summer and the windows
open, both George and Sweetwater might have heard every word; for
the tones were exceptionally rich and penetrating, and the speaker
intent only on the impression he was endeavouring to make upon his
audience. That he had not mistaken his power in this direction was
evinced by the applause which rose from time to time from innumerable
hands and feet. But this uproar would be speedily silenced, and the
mellow voice ring out again, clear and commanding. What could the
subject be to rouse such enthusiasm in the Associated Brotherhood
of the Awl, the Plane and the Trowel? There was a moment when our
listening friends expected to be enlightened. A shutter was thrown
back in one of those upper windows, and the window hurriedly raised,
during which words took the place of sounds and they heard enough
to whet their appetite for more. But only that. The shutter was
speedily restored to place, and the window again closed. A wise
precaution, or so thought George if they wished to keep their
doubtful proceedings secret.
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