Books: Initials Only
A >>
Anna Katharine Green >> Initials Only
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 | 6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19
At this, the listening Sweetwater hoped that Dr. Heath would ignore
the suggestion thus conveyed and decline the explanation it
apparently demanded. But the impression made by the gentleman's
good looks had been too strong for this coroner's proverbial caution,
and, handing over the slip of a note which had been found among Miss
Challoner's effects by her father, he quietly asked:
"Do you recognise the signature?"
"Yes, it is mine."
"Then you acknowledge yourself the author of these lines?"
"Most certainly. Have I not said that this is my signature?"
"Do you remember the words of this note, Mr. Brotherson?"
"Hardly. I recollect its tenor, but not the exact words."
"Read them."
"Excuse me, I had rather not. I am aware that they were bitter and
should be the cause of great regret. I was angry when I wrote them."
"That is evident. But the cause of your anger is not so clear, Mr.
Brotherson. Miss Challoner was a woman of lofty character, or such
was the universal opinion of her friends. What could she have done
to a gentleman like yourself to draw forth such a tirade?"
"You ask that?"
"I am obliged to. There is mystery surrounding her death;--the
kind of mystery which demands perfect frankness on the part of all
who were near her on that evening, or whose relations to her were in
any way peculiar. You acknowledge that your friendship was of such
a guarded nature that it surprised you greatly to hear it recognised.
Yet you could write her a letter of this nature. Why?"
"Because--" the word came glibly; but the next one was long in
following. "Because," he repeated, letting the fire of some strong
feeling disturb for a moment his dignified reserve, "I offered myself
to Miss Challoner, and she dismissed me with great disdain."
"Ah! and so you thought a threat was due her?"
"A threat?"
"These words contain a threat, do they not?"
"They may. I was hardly master of myself at the time. I may have
expressed myself in an unfortunate manner."
"Read the words, Mr. Brotherson. I really must insist that you do
so."
There was no hesitancy now. Rising, he leaned over the table and
read the few words the other had spread out for his perusal. Then
he slowly rose to his full height, as he answered, with some slight
display of compunction:
"I remember it perfectly now. It is not a letter to be proud of.
I hope--"
"Pray finish, Mr. Brotherson."
"That you are not seeking to establish a connection between this
letter and her violent death?"
"Letters of this sort are often very mischievous, Mr. Brotherson.
The harshness with which this is written might easily rouse emotions
of a most unhappy nature in the breast of a woman as sensitive as
Miss Challoner."
"Pardon me, Dr. Heath; I cannot flatter myself so far. You overrate
my influence with the lady you name."
"You believe, then, that she was sincere in her rejection of your
addresses?"
A start, too slight to be noted by any one but the watchful
Sweetwater, showed that this question had gone home. But the
self-poise and mental control of this man were perfect, and in an
instant he was facing the coroner again, with a dignity which gave
no clew to the disturbance into which his thoughts had just been
thrown. Nor was this disturbance apparent in his tones when he made
his reply:
"I have never allowed myself to think otherwise. I have seen no
reason why I should. The suggestion you would convey by such a
question is hardly welcome, now. I pray you to be careful in your
judgment of such a woman's impulses. They often spring from sources
not to be sounded even by her dearest friends."
Just; but how cold! Dr. Heath, eyeing him with admiration rather
than sympathy, hesitated how to proceed; while Sweetwater, peering
up from his papers, sought in vain for some evidence of the bereaved
lover in the impressive but wholly dispassionate figure of him who
had just spoken. Had pride got the better of his heart? or had
that organ always been subordinate to the will in this man of
instincts so varying, that at one time he impressed you simply as a
typical gentleman of leisure; at another, as no more than a fiery
agitator with powers absorbed by, if not limited to the one cause
he advocated; and again--and this seemed the most contradictory of
all--just the ardent inventor, living in a tenement, with Science
for his goddess and work always under his hand? As the young
detective weighed these possibilities and marvelled over the
contradictions they offered, he forgot the papers now lying quiet
under his hand. He was too interested to remember his own part
--something which could not often be said of Sweetwater.
Meantime, the coroner had collected his thoughts. With an apology
for the extremely personal nature of his inquiry, he asked Mr.
Brotherson if he would object to giving him some further details
of his acquaintanceship with Miss Challoner; where he first met her
and under what circumstances their friendship had developed.
"Not at all," was the ready reply. "I have nothing to conceal in
the matter. I only wish that her father were present that he might
listen to the recital of my acquaintanceship with his daughter. He
might possibly understand her better and regard with more leniency
the presumption into which I was led by my ignorance of the pride
inherent in great families."
"Your wish can very easily be gratified," returned the official,
pressing an electric button on his desk;
"Mr. Challoner is in the adjoining room." Then, as the door
communicating with the room he had mentioned swung ajar and stood
so, Dr. Heath added, without apparent consciousness of the dramatic
character of this episode, "You will not need to raise your voice
beyond its natural pitch. He can hear perfectly from where he sits."
"Thank you. I am glad to speak in his presence," came in undisturbed
self-possession from this not easily surprised witness. "I shall
relate the facts exactly as they occurred, adding nothing and
concealing nothing. If I mistook my position, or Miss Challoner's
position, it is not for me to apologise. I never hid my business
from her, nor the moderate extent of my fortune. If she knew me
at all, she knew me for what I am; a man of the people who glories
in work and who has risen by it to a position somewhat unique in
this city. I feel no lack of equality even with such a woman as
Miss Challoner."
A most unnecessary preamble, no doubt, and of doubtful efficacy in
smoothing his way to a correct understanding with the deeply bereaved
father. But he looked so handsome as he thus asserted himself and
made so much of his inches and the noble poise of his head--though
cold of eye and always cold of manner--that those who saw, as well
as heard him, forgave this display of egotism in consideration of
its honesty and the dignity it imparted to his person.
"I first met Miss Challoner in the Berkshires," he began, after a
moment of quiet listening for any possible sound from the other room.
"I had been on the tramp, and had stopped at one of the great hotels
for a seven days' rest. I will acknowledge that I chose this spot
at the instigation of a relative who knew my tastes and how perfectly
they might be gratified there. That I should mingle with the guests
may not have been in his thought, any more than it was in mine at
the beginning of my stay. The panorama of beauty spread out before
me on every side was sufficient in itself for my enjoyment, and might
have continued so to the end if my attention had not been very
forcibly drawn on one memorable morning to a young lady--Miss
Challoner--by the very earnest look she gave me as I was crossing
the office from one verandah to another. I must insist on this look,
even if it shock the delicacy of my listeners, for without the
interest it awakened in me, I might not have noticed the blush with
which she turned aside to join her friends on the verandah. It was
an overwhelming blush which could not have sprung from any slight
embarrassment, and, though I hate the pretensions of those egotists
who see in a woman's smile more than it by right conveys, I could
not help being moved by this display of feeling in one so gifted
with every grace and attribute of the perfect woman. With less
caution than I usually display, I approached the desk where she had
been standing and, meeting the eyes of the clerk, asked the young
lady's name. He gave it, and waited for me to express the surprise
he expected it to evoke. But I felt none and showed none. Other
feelings had seized me. I had heard of this gracious woman from
many sources, in my life among the suffering masses of New York, and
now that I had seen her and found her to be not only my ideal of
personal loveliness but seemingly approachable and not uninterested
in myself, I allowed my fancy to soar and my heart to become touched.
A fact which the clerk now confided to me naturally deepened the
impression. Miss Challoner had seen my name in the guest-book and
asked to have me pointed out to her. Perhaps she had heard my name
spoken in the same quarter where I had heard hers. We have never
exchanged confidences on the subject, and I cannot say. I can only
give you my reason for the interest I felt in Miss Challoner and why
I forgot, in the glamour of this episode, the aims and purposes of
a not unambitious life and the distance which the world and the
so-called aristocratic class put between a woman of her wealth and
standing and a simple worker like myself.
"I must be pardoned. She had smiled upon me once, and she smiled
again. Days before we were formally presented, I caught her
softened look turned my way, as we passed each other in hall or
corridor. We were friends, or so it appeared to me, before ever
a word passed between us, and when fortune favoured us and we were
duly introduced, our minds met in a strange sympathy which made
this one interview a memorable one to me. Unhappily, as I then
considered it, this was my last day at the hotel, and our
conversation, interrupted frequently by passing acquaintances, was
never resumed. I exchanged a few words with her by way of good-bye
but nothing more. I came to New York, and she remained in Lenox.
A month after and she too came to New York."
"This good-bye--do you remember it? The exact language, I mean?"
"I do; it made a great impression on me. 'I shall hope for our
further acquaintance,' she said. 'We have one very strong interest
in common.' And if ever a human face spoke eloquently, it was hers
at that moment. The interest, as I understood it, was our mutual
sympathy for our toiling, half-starved, down-trodden brothers and
sisters in the lower streets of this city; but the eloquence--that
I probably mistook. I thought it sprang from personal interest, and
it gave me courage to pursue the intention which had taken the place
of every other feeling and ambition by which I had hitherto been
moved. Here was a woman in a thousand; one who could make a man of
me indeed. If she could ignore the social gulf between us, I felt
free to take the leap. Cowardice had never been a fault of mine.
But I was no fool even then. I realised that I must first let her
see the manner of man I was and what life meant to me and must mean
to her if the union I contemplated should become an actual fact. I
wrote letters to her, but I did not give her my address or even
request a reply. I was not ready for any word from her. I am not
like other men and I could wait. And I did, for weeks, then I
suddenly appeared at her hotel."
The change of voice--the bitterness which he infused into this
final sentence made every one look up. Hitherto he had spoken
calmly, almost monotonously, as if no present heart-beat responded
to this tale of vanished love; but with the words, "Then I suddenly
appeared at her hotel," he showed himself human again, and betrayed
a passion which though curbed was of the fiery quality, befitting
his extraordinary attributes of mind and person.
"This was when?" put in Dr. Heath, anxious to bridge the pause which
must have been very painful to the listening father.
"The week after Thanksgiving. I did not see her the first day, and
only casually the second. But she knew I was in the building, and
when I came upon her one evening seated at the very desk in the
mezzanine which we all have such bitter cause to remember, I could
not forbear expressing myself in a way she could not misunderstand.
The result was of a kind to drive a man like myself to an extremity
of self-condemnation and rage. She rose up as if insulted, and
flung me one sentence and one sentence only before she hailed the
elevator and left my presence. A cur could not have been dismissed
with less ceremony."
"That is not like my daughter. What was the sentence you allude to?
Let me hear the very words." Mr. Challoner had come forward and now
stood awaiting his reply, a dignified but pathetic figure, which all
must view with respect.
"I hate the memory of them, but since you demand it, I will repeat
them just as they fell from her lips," was Mr. Brotherson's bitter
retort. "She said, 'You of all men should recognise the
unseemliness of these proposals. Had your letters given me any
hint of the feelings you have just expressed, you would never have
had this opportunity of approaching me.' That was all; but her
indignation was scathing. Ladies who have supped exclusively off
silver, show a fine scorn for the common ware of the cottager."
Mr. Challoner bowed. "There is some mistake," said he. "My daughter
might be averse to your addresses, but she would never show
indignation to any aspirant for her hand, simply on account of
extraneous conditions. She had wide sympathies--wider than I often
approved. Something in your conduct or the confidence you showed
shocked her nicer sense; not your lack of the luxuries she often
misprised. This much I feel obliged to say, out of justice to her
character, which was uniformly considerate."
"You have seen her with men of her own world and yours," was the
harsh response. "She had another side to her nature for the man
of a different sphere. And it killed my love--that you can see
--and led to my sending her the injudicious letter with which you
have confronted me. The hurt bull utters one bellow before he dies.
I bellowed, and bellowed loudly, but I did not die. I'm my own
man still and mean to remain so."
The assertive boldness--some would call it bravado--with which he
thus finished the story of his relations with the dead heiress,
seemed to be more than Mr. Challoner could stand. With a look of
extreme pain and perplexity he vanished from the doorway, and it
fell to Dr. Heath to inquire:
"Is this letter--a letter of threat you will remember--the only
communication which passed between you and Miss Challoner after this
unfortunate passage of arms at the Clermont?"
"Yes. I had no wish to address her again. I had exhausted in this
one outburst whatever humiliation I felt."
"And she? Did she give no sign, make you no answer?"
"None whatever." Then, as if he found it impossible to hide this
hurt to his pride, "She did not even seem to consider me worthy the
honour of an added rebuke. Such arrogance is, no doubt, commendable
in a Challoner."
This time his bitterness did not pass unrebuked by the coroner:
"Remember the grey hairs of the only Challoner who can hear you,
and respect his grief."
Mr. Brotherson bowed.
"I have finished," said he. "I shall have nothing more to say on
the subject." And he drew himself up in expectation of the dismissal
he evidently thought pending.
But the coroner was not done with him by any means. He had a theory
in regard to this lamentable suicide which he hoped to establish by
this man's testimony, and, in pursuit of this plan, he not only
motioned to Mr. Brotherson to reseat himself, but began at once to
open a fresh line of examination by saying:
"You will pardon me, if I press this matter. I have been given to
understand that notwithstanding your break with Miss Challoner, you
have kept up your visits to the Clermont and were even on the spot
at the time of her death."
"On the spot?"
"In the hotel, I mean."
"There you are right; I was in the hotel."
"At the time of her death?"
"Very near the time. I remember hearing some disturbance in the
lobby behind me, just as I was passing out at the Broadway entrance."
"You did, and did not return?"
"Why should I return? I am not a man of much curiosity. There was
no reason why I should connect a sudden alarm in the lobby of the
Clermont with any cause of special interest to myself."
This was so true and the look which accompanied the words was so
frank that the coroner hesitated a moment before he said:
"Certainly not, unless--well, to be direct, unless you had just
seen Miss Challoner and knew her state of mind and what was likely
to follow your abrupt departure."
"I had no interview with Miss Challoner."
"But you saw her? Saw her that evening and just before the accident?"
Sweetwater's papers rattled; it was the only sound to be heard in
that moment of silence. Then--"What do you mean by those words?"
inquired Mr. Brotherson, with studied composure. "I have said that
I had no interview with Miss Challoner. Why do you ask me then, if
I saw her?"
"Because I believe that you did. From a distance possibly, but yet
directly and with no possibility of mistake."
"Do you put that as a question?"
"I do. Did you see her figure or face that night?"
"I did."
Nothing--not even the rattling of Sweetwater's papers--disturbed
the silence which followed this admission.
"From where?" Dr. Heath asked at last.
"From a point far enough away to make any communication between us
impossible. I do not think you will require me to recall the exact
spot."
"If it were one which made it possible for her to see you as clearly
as you could see her, I think it would be very advisable for you to
say so."
"It was--such--a spot."
"Then I think I can locate it for you, or do you prefer to locate
it yourself?"
"I will locate it myself. I had hoped not to be called upon to
mention what I cannot but consider a most unfortunate coincidence.
As a gentleman you will understand my reticence and also why it is
a matter of regret to me that with an acumen worthy of your position,
you should have discovered a fact which, while it cannot explain
Miss Challoner's death, will drag our little affair before the
public, and possibly give it a prominence in some minds which I am
sure does not belong to it. I met Miss Challoner's eye for one
instant from the top of the little staircase running up to the
mezzanine. I had yielded thus far to an impulse I had frequently
combated, to seek by another interview to retrieve the bad effect
which must have been made upon her by my angry note. I knew that
she frequently wrote letters in the mezzanine at this hour, and
got as far as the top of the staircase in my effort to join her.
But got no further. When I saw her on her feet, with her face
turned my way, I remembered the scorn with which she had received
my former heart-felt proposals and, without taking another step
forward, I turned away from her and fled down the steps and so out
of the building by the main entrance. She saw me, for her hand flew
up with a startled gesture, but I cannot think that my presence on
the same floor with her could have caused her to strike the blow
which terminated her life. Why should I? No woman sacrifices her
life out of mere regret for the disdain she has shown a man she has
taken no pains to understand."
His tone and his attitude seemed to invite the concurrence of Dr.
Heath in this statement. But the richness of the one and the grace
of the other showed the handsome speaker off to such advantage that
the coroner was rather inclined to consider how a woman, even of
Miss Challoner's fine taste and careful breeding, might see in such
a situation much for regret, if not for active despair and the
suicidal act. He gave no evidence of his thought, however, but
followed up the one admission made by Mr. Brotherson which he and
others must naturally view as of the first importance.
"You saw Miss Challoner lift her hand, you say. Which hand, and
what was in it? Anything?"
"She lifted her right hand, but it would be impossible for me to
tell you whether there was anything in it or not. I simply saw
the movement before I turned away. It looked like one of alarm
to me. I felt that she had some reason for this. She could not
know that it was in repentance I came rather than in fulfilment
of my threat."
A sigh from the adjoining room. Mr. Brotherson rose, as he heard
it, and in doing so met the clear eye of Sweetwater fixed upon his
own. Its language was, no doubt, peculiar and it seemed to
fascinate him for a moment, for he started as if to approach the
detective, but forsook this intention almost immediately, and
addressing the coroner, gravely remarked:
"Her death following so quickly upon this abortive attempt of mine
at an interview startled me by its coincidence as much as it does
you. If in the weakness of her woman's nature, it was more than
this--if the scorn she had previously shown me was a cloak she
instinctively assumed to hide what she was not ready to disclose,
my remorse will be as great as any one here could wish. But the
proof of all this will have to be very convincing before my present
convictions will yield to it. Some other and more poignant source
will have to be found for that instant's impulsive act than is
supplied by this story of my unfortunate attachment."
Dr. Heath was convinced, but he was willing to concede something
to the secret demand made upon him by Sweetwater, who was bundling
up his papers with much clatter.
Looking up with a smile which had elements in it he was hardly
conscious of perhaps himself, he asked in an off-hand way:
"Then why did you take such pains to wash your hands of the affair
the moment you had left the hotel?"
"I do not understand."
"You passed around the corner into--street, did you not?"
"Very likely. I could go that way as well as another."
"And stopped at the first lamp-post?"
"Oh, I see. Someone saw that childish action of mine."
"What did you mean by it?"
"Just what you have suggested. I did go through the pantomime of
washing my hands of an affair I considered definitely ended. I had
resisted an irrepressible impulse to see and talk with Miss Challoner
again, and was pleased with my firmness. Unaware of the tragic blow
which had just fallen, I was full of self-congratulations at my
escape from the charm which had lured me back to this hotel again
and again in spite of my better judgment, and I wished to symbolise
my relief by an act of which I was, in another moment, ashamed.
Strange that there should have been a witness to it. (Here he stole
a look at Sweetwater.) Stranger still, that circumstances by the
most extraordinary of coincidences, should have given so unforeseen
a point to it."
"You are right, Mr. Brotherson. The whole occurrence is startling
and most strange. But life is made up of the unexpected, as none
know better than we physicians, whether our practice be of a public
or private character."
As Mr. Brotherson left the room, the curiosity to which he had
yielded once before, led him to cast a glance of penetrating inquiry
behind him full at Sweetwater, and if either felt embarrassment, it
was not the hunted but the hunter.
But the feeling did not last.
"I've simply met the strongest man I've ever encountered," was
Sweetwater's encouraging comment to himself. "All the more glory
if I can find a joint in his armour or a hidden passage to his cold,
secretive heart."
XI
ALIKE IN ESSENTIALS
"Mr. Gryce, I am either a fool or the luckiest fellow going. You
must decide which."
The aged detective, thus addressed, laid down his evening paper and
endeavoured to make out the dim form he could just faintly discern
standing between him and the library door.
"Sweetwater, is that you?"
"No one else. Sweetwater, the fool, or Sweetwater, much too wise
for his own good. I don't know which. Perhaps you can find out
and tell me."
A grunt from the region of the library table, then the sarcastic
remark:
"I'm just in the mood to settle that question. This last failure
to my account ought to make me an excellent judge of another's folly.
I've meddled with the old business for the last time, Sweetwater.
You'll have to go it lone from now on. The Department has no more
work for Ebenezar Gryce, or rather Ebenezar Gryce will make no more
fool attempts to please them. Strange that a man don't know when
his time has come to quit. I remember low I once scored Yeardsley
for hanging on after he had lost his grip; and here am I doing the
same thing. But what's the matter with you? Speak out, my boy.
Something new in the wind?"
"No, Mr. Gryce; nothing new. It's the same old business. But, if
what I suspect is true, this same old business offers opportunities
for some very interesting and unusual effort. You're not satisfied
with the coroner's verdict in the Challoner case?"
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 | 6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19