The Blind Man's Eyes (July 1916)/Chapter 21
CHAPTER XXI
WHAT ONE CAN DO WITHOUT EYES
THE blind man, lying on his bed in that darkness in which he had lived since his sixteenth year and which no daylight could lessen, felt the light and knew that day had come; he stirred impatiently. The nurse, the only other occupant of the room, moved expectantly; then she sank back; Santoine had moved but had not roused from that absorption in which he had been ever since returning to his bed. He had not slept. The connections of the electric bells had been repaired,—the wires had been found pulled from their batteries,—but Santoine had not moved a hand to touch a button. He had disregarded the warning of the doctor who had been summoned at once after the murder and had come to his room again just before dawn to warn him that after his recklessness of the night he must expect a reaction. He had given such injunctions in regard to any new development that he was certain that, even if his servants believed him asleep, they would report to him. But there had been no report; and Santoine expected none immediately. He had not lain awake awaiting anything; he felt that so much had happened, so many facts were at his command, that somewhere among them must be the key to what they meant.
The blind man knew that his daughter was concealing something from him. He could not tell what the importance of the thing she was concealing might be; but he knew his daughter was enough like himself for it to be useless for him to try to force from her something she did not mean to tell. The new intimacy of the relation between his daughter and Eaton was perfectly plain to Santoine; but it did not cause him to try to explain anything in Eaton's favor; nor did it prejudice him against him. He had appeared to accept Avery's theory of what had happened in the study because by doing so he concealed what was going on in his own mind; he actually accepted it only to the point of agreeing that Eaton must have met in the study those enemies—or some one representing the enemies—who had attacked him with the motor-car and had before attempted to attack him on the train.
Three men—at least three men—had fought in the study in Santoine's presence. Eaton, it was certain, had been the only one from the house present when the first shots were fired. Had Eaton been alone against the other two? Had Eaton been with one of the other two against the third? It appeared probable to Santoine that Eaton had been alone, or had come alone, to the study and had met his enemies there. Had these enemies surprised Eaton in the study or had he surprised them? Santoine was inclined to believe that Eaton had surprised them. The contents taken from the safe had certainly been carried away, and these would have made rather a bulky bundle. Eaton could not have carried it without Harriet knowing it. Santoine believed that, whatever knowledge his daughter might be concealing from him, she would not have concealed this. It was certain that some time had been necessary for opening the safe, before those opening it suffered interruption.
Santoine felt, therefore, that the probabilities were that Eaton's enemies had opened the safe and had been surprised by Eaton. But if they had opened the safe, they were not only Eaton's enemies; they were also Santoine's; they were the men who threatened Santoine's trust.
Those whom Eaton had fought in the room had had perfect opportunity for killing Santoine, if they wished. He had stood first in the dark with the electric torch in his hand; then he had been before them in the light after Blatchford had entered. But Santoine felt certain no one had made any attack upon him at any moment in the room; he had had no feeling, at any instant, that any of the shots fired had been directed at him. Blatchford, too, had been unattacked until he had made it plain that he had recognized one of the intruders; then, before Blatchford could call the name, he had been shot down.
It was clear, then, that what had protected Santoine was his blindness; he had no doubt that, if he had been able to see and recognize the men in the room after the lights were turned on, he would have been shot down also. But Santoine recognized that this did not fully account for his immunity. Two weeks before, an attack which had been meant for Eaton had struck down Santoine instead; and no further attempt against Eaton had been made until it had become publicly known that Santoine was not going to die. If Santoine's death would have served for Eaton's death two weeks before, why was Santoine immune now? Did possession of the contents of Santoine's safe accomplish the same thing as Santoine's death? Or more than his death for these men? For what men?
It was not, Santoine was certain, Eaton's presence in the study which had so astounded Blatchford; Wallace and Eaton had passed days together, and Blatchford was accustomed to Eaton's presence in the house. Some one whom Blatchford knew and whose name Santoine also would know and whose presence in the room was so strange and astonishing that Blatchford had tried to prepare Santoine for the announcement, had been there. The man whose name was on Blatchford's tongue, or the companion of that man, had shot Blatchford rather than let Santoine hear the name.
The blind man stirred upon his bed.
"Do you want something, Mr. Santoine?" the nurse asked. The blind man did not answer. He was beginning to find these events fit themselves together; but they fitted imperfectly as yet.
Santoine knew that he lacked the key. Many men could profit by possessing the contents of Santoine's safe and might have shot Blatchford rather than let Santoine know their presence there; it was impossible for Santoine to tell which among these many the man who had been in the study might be. Who Eaton's enemies were was equally unknown to Santoine. But there could be but one man—or at most one small group of men—who could be at the same time Eaton's enemy and Santoine's. To have known who Eaton was would have pointed this man to Santoine.
The blind man lay upon his back, his open, sightless eyes unwinking in the intensity of his thought.
Gabriel Warden had had an appointment with a young man who had come from Asia and who—Warden had told his wife—he had discovered lately had been greatly wronged. Eaton, under Conductor Connery's questioning, had admitted himself to be that young man; Santoine had verified this and had learned that Eaton was, at least, the young man who had gone to Warden's house that night. But Gabriel Warden had not been allowed to help Eaton; so far from that, he had not even been allowed to meet and talk with Eaton; he had been called out, plainly, to prevent his meeting Eaton, and killed.
Eaton disappeared and concealed himself at once after Warden's murder, apparently fearing that he would also be attacked. But Eaton was not a man whom this personal fear would have restrained from coming forward later to tell why Warden had been killed. He had been urged to come forward and promised that others would give him help in Warden's place; still, he had concealed himself. This must mean that others than Warden could not help Eaton; Eaton evidently did not know, or else could not hope to prove, what Warden had discovered.
Santoine held this thought in abeyance; he would see later how it checked with the facts.
Eaton had remained in Seattle—or near Seattle—eleven days; apparently he had been able to conceal himself and to escape attack during that time. He had been obliged, however, to reveal himself when he took the train; and as soon as possible a desperate attempt had been made against him, which, through mistake, had struck down Santoine instead of Eaton. This attack had been made under circumstances which, if it had been successful, would have made it improbable that Eaton's murderer could escape. It had not been enough, then, to watch Eaton and await opportunity to attack him; it had been necessary to attack him at once, at any cost.
The attack having reached Santoine instead of Eaton, the necessity for immediate attack upon Eaton, apparently, had ceased to exist; those who followed Eaton had thought it enough to watch him and wait for more favorable opportunity. But as soon as it was publicly known that Santoine had not been killed but was getting well, then Eaton had again been openly and daringly attacked. The reason for the desperate chances taken to attack Eaton, then, was that he was near Santoine.
Santoine's hands clenched as he recognized this.
Eaton had taken the train at Seattle because Santoine was on it; he had done this at great risk to himself. Santoine had told Eaton that there were but four possible reasons why he could have taken the train in the manner he did, and two of those reasons later had been eliminated. The two possibilities which remained were that Eaton had taken the train to inform Santoine of something or to learn something from him. But Eaton had had ample opportunity since to inform Santoine of anything he wished; and he had not only not informed him of anything, but had refused consistently and determinedly to answer any of Santoine's questions. It was to learn something from Santoine, then, that Eaton had taken the train.
The blind man turned upon his bed; he was finding that these events fitted together perfectly. He felt certain now that Eaton had gone to Gabriel Warden expecting to get from Warden some information that he needed, and that to prevent Warden's giving him this, Warden had been killed. Then Warden's death had caused Santoine to go to Seattle and take charge of many of Warden's affairs; Eaton had thought that the information which had been in Warden's possession might now be in Santoine's; Eaton, therefore, had followed Santoine onto the train.
Santoine had not had the information Eaton required, and he could not even imagine yet what the nature of that information could be. This was not because he was not familiar enough with Warden's affairs; it was because he was too familiar with them. Warden had been concerned in a hundred enterprises; Santoine had no way of telling which of this hundred had concerned Eaton. He certainly could recall no case in which a man of Eaton's age and class had been so terribly wronged that double murder would have been resorted to for the concealment of the facts. But he understood that, in his familiarity with Warden's affairs, he had probably been in a position to get the information, if he had known what specific matters it concerned. That, then, had been the reason why his own death would have served for the time being in place of Eaton's.
Those who had followed Eaton had known that Santoine could get this information; that accounted for all that had taken place on the train. It accounted for the subsequent attack on Eaton when it became known that Santoine was getting well. It accounted also—Santoine was breathing quickly as he recognized this—for the invasion of his study and the forcing of the safe last night.
The inference was plain that something which would have given Santoine the information Warden had had and which Eaton now required had been brought into Santoine's house and put in Santoine's safe. It was to get possession of this "something" before it had reached Santoine that the safe had been forced.
Santoine put out his hand and pressed a bell. A servant came to the door.
"Will you find Miss Santoine," the blind man directed, "and ask her to come here?"
The servant withdrew.
Santoine waited. Presently the door again opened, and he heard his daughter's step.
"Have you listed what was taken from the safe, Harriet?" Santoine asked.
"Not yet, Father."
The blind man thought an instant. "Day before yesterday, when I asked you to take charge for the present of the correspondence Avery has looked after for me, what did you do?"
"I put it in my own safe—the one that was broken into last night. But none of it was taken; the bundles of letters were pulled out of the safe, but they had not been opened or even disturbed."
"I know. It was not that I meant." Santoine thought again. "Harriet, something has been brought into the house—or the manner of keeping something in the house had been changed—within a very few days—since the time, I think, when the attempt to run Eaton down with the motor-car was made. What was that 'something'?"
His daughter reflected. "The draft of the new agreement about the Latron properties and the lists of stockholders in the properties which came through Mr. Warden's office," she replied.
"Those were in the safe?"
"Yes; you had not given me any instructions about them, so I had put them in the other safe; but when I went to get the correspondence I saw them there and put them with the correspondence in my own safe."
Santoine lay still.
"Who besides Donald knew that you did that, daughter?" he asked.
"No one."
"Thank you."
Harriet recognized this as dismissal and went out. The blind man felt the blood beating fiercely in his temples and at his finger-tips. It amazed, astounded him to realize that Warden's murder and all that had followed it had sprung from the Latron case. The coupling of Warden's name with Latron's in the newspapers after Warden's death had seemed to him only flagrant sensationalism. He himself had known—or had thought he had known—more about the Latron case than almost any other man; he had been a witness at the trial; he had seen—or had thought he had seen—even-handed justice done there. Now, by Warden's evidence, but more still by the manner of Warden's death, he was forced to believe that there had been something unknown to him and terrible in what had been done then.
And as realization of this came to him, he recollected that he had been vaguely conscious ever since Latron's murder of something strained, something not wholly open, in his relations with those men whose interests had been most closely allied with Latron's. It had been nothing open, nothing palpable; it was only that he had felt at times in them a knowledge of some general condition governing them which was not wholly known to himself. As he pressed his hands upon his blind eyes, trying to define this feeling to himself, his thought went swiftly back to the events on the train and in the study.
He had had investigated the accounts of themselves given by the passengers to Conductor Connery; two of these accounts had proved to be false. The man who under the name of Lawrence Hillward had claimed the cipher telegram from Eaton had been one of these; it had proved impossible to trace this man and it was now certain that Hillward was not his real name; the other, Santoine had had no doubt, was the heavy-set muscular man who had tried to run Eaton down with the motor. These men, Santoine was sure, had been acting for some principal not present. One or both of these men might have been in the study last night; but the sight of neither of these could have so startled, so astounded Blatchford. Whomever Blatchford had seen was some one well known to him, whose presence had been so amazing that speech had failed Blatchford for the moment and he had feared the effect of the announcement on Santoine. This could have been only the principal himself.
Some circumstance which Santoine comprehended only imperfectly as yet had forced this man to come out from behind his agents and to act even at the risk of revealing himself. It was probably he who, finding Blatchford's presence made revealment inevitable, had killed Blatchford. But these circumstances gave Santoine no clew as to who the man might be. The blind man tried vainly to guess. The rebellion against his blindness, which had seized him the night before, again stirred him. The man had been in the light just before his face; a second of sight then and everything would have been clear; or another word from Blatchford, and he would have known. But Santoine recalled that if he had had that second of sight, and the other man had known it, or if Blatchford had spoken that next word, Santoine too would probably be dead.
The only circumstance regarding the man of which Santoine now felt sure was that he was one of the many concerned in the Latron case or with the Latron properties. Had the blood in which Santoine had stepped upon the study floor been his, or that of one of the others?
"What time is it?" the blind man suddenly asked the nurse.
"It is nearly noon, Mr. Santoine, and you have eaten nothing."
The blind man did not answer. He recalled vaguely that, several hours before, breakfast had been brought for him and that he had impatiently waved it away. In his absorption he had felt no need then for food, and he felt none now.
"Will you leave me alone for a few moments?" he directed.
He listened till he heard the door close behind the nurse; then he seized the private 'phone beside his bed and called his broker. Instinctively, in his uncertainty, Santoine had turned to that barometer which reflects day by day, even from hour to hour, the most obscure events and the most secret knowledge.
"How is the market?" he inquired.
There was something approaching to a panic on the stock-exchange, it appeared. Some movement, arising from causes not yet clear, had dropped the bottom out of a score of important stocks. The broker was only able to relate that about an hour after the opening of the exchange, selling had developed in certain issues and prices were going down in complete lack of support.
"How is Pacific Midlands?" Santoine asked.
"It led the decline."
Santoine felt the blood in his temples. "M. and N. Smelters?" he asked.
"Down seven points."
"S. F. and D.?"
"Eight points off."
Santoine's hand, holding the telephone, shook in its agitation; his head was hot from the blood rushing through it, his body was chilled. An idea so strange, so astounding, so incredible as it first had come to him that his feelings refused it though his reason told him it was the only possible condition which could account for all the facts, now was being made all but certain. He named stock after stock; all were down—seriously depressed or had been supported only by a desperate effort of their chief holders.
"A. L. & M. is down too," the broker volunteered.
"That is only sympathetic," Santoine replied.
He hung up. His hand, straining to control its agitation, reached for the bell; he rang; a servant came.
"Get me note-paper," Santoine commanded.
The servant went out and returned with paper. The nurse had followed him in; she turned the leaf of the bed-table for Santoine to write. The blind man could write as well as any other by following the position of the lines with the fingers of his left hand. He wrote a short note swiftly now, folded, sealed and addressed it and handed it to the servant.
"Have that delivered by a messenger at once," he directed. "There will be no written answer, I think; only something sent back—a photograph. See that it is brought to me at once."
He heard the servant's footsteps going rapidly away. He was shaking with anger, horror, resentment; he was almost—not quite—sure now of all that had taken place; of why Warden had been murdered, of what vague shape had moved behind and guided all that had happened since. He recalled Eaton's voice as he had heard it first on the train at Seattle; and now he was almost sure—not quite—that he could place that voice, that he knew where he had heard it before.
He lay with clenched hands, shaking with rage; then by effort of his will he put these thoughts away. The nurse reminded him again of his need for food.
"I want nothing now," he said. "Have it ready when I wake up. When the doctor comes, tell him I am going to get up to-day and dress."
He turned and stretched himself upon his bed; so, finally, he slept.