The Holladay Case (Detective Story Magazine)/Chapter 3
CHAPTER III.
The Coil Tightens.
My chief's face turned livid. He had driven another rivet in the chain—just the one it needed to hold it firmly together.
Goldberg and the district attorney were whispering together, and I saw the former glance from the handkerchief on the desk before him to the sobbing woman on the stand. It needed only the maid's identification of that square of cambric to complete the evidence.
“Anything further, Mr. Royce?” he asked.
“Not at present, sir,” answered our junior hoarsely.
“We will dismiss the witness, then, temporarily. We shall probably recall her later on.”
As the maid was led back to the witness room, Goldberg looked over the papers on his desk.
“We have one more witness,” he said, “Miss Holladay's chauffeur. If you wish to adjourn for lunch, Mr. Royce, I'm quite ready to do so.”
“Thank you, sir,” said my chief. “I do wish it. I should like, however, to see Miss Holladay a few moments in private, to arrange our rebuttal.”
“I'll be very glad to allow you to see her in private,” Goldberg answered readily. “I regret greatly that we couldn't find you last night, so that you could have opportunity to prepare for this hearing.”
Royce, after thanking Doctor Goldberg, turned to me. “Lester, you'd better go and get some lunch.”
“Better still, have two meals ready in half an hour, at Rotin's. I'll go to Miss Holladay now, and then come direct to Rotin's. We will bring back with us something for her.”
He hurried away after Goldberg, and I walked slowly over to Rotin's to give the necessary order.
“It is a most extraor-rdinary affair,” said a voice at my elbow. I turned with a start to see that the chair just behind me had been taken by a man who was also reading an account of the crime. He laid the paper down, and caught my eye. “A most extraor-rdinary affair!” he repeated, appealing to me.
I got an impression of a florid face, of a stout, well-dressed body, of an air unmistakably French.
“You will pardon me, sir,” he added, leaning a little forward. “As a stranger in this country, I am much inter-rested in your processes of law. This morning I was present at the trial—I per-rceived you there. It seemed to me that the young lady was in—what you call—a tight place.”
He spoke English well, but with an accent. I glanced at him again, and saw that his eyes were very bright and that they were fixed upon me intently.
“It does seem so,” I grudgingly admitted.
“You will pardon me,” he went on persuasively, “but concer-rning one point I should like much to know. If she is thought guilty what will occur?”
“She will be bound over to the grand jury,” I explained.
“That is, she will be placed in prison?”
“Of course.”
“But, as I understand your law, she may be released by bondsmen.”
“Not in a capital case,” I said; “not in a case of this kind, where the penalty may be death.”
“Ah, I see,” and he nodded slowly. “She would then not be again released until after she shall have been proved innocent. How great a time would that occupy?”
“I can't say—six months—a year, perhaps.”
“Ah, I see,” he said again. “Thank you, ver' much, sir.”
He arose and went slowly out, and I noted the strength of his figure.
The waiter came with bread and butter, and a glance at my watch showed me that nearly an hour had gone. I waited fifteen minutes longer, ate what I could, and, taking a box lunch under my arm, hurried back to the medical examiner's office. As I entered it, I saw a bowed figure sitting at the table.
“I've brought your lunch, Mr. Royce,” I said, with what lightness I could muster. “The proceedings will commence in half an hour—you'd better eat something,” and I opened the box.
He looked at it for a moment, and then began mechanically to eat.
“Must I order lunch for Miss Holladay?” I questioned.
“No,” he said. “She said she didn't wish any.”
He relapsed again into silence. Plainly, he had received some new blow during my absence.
“After all,” I began, “you know we've only to prove an alibi to knock to pieces this whole house of cards.”
“Yes, that's all,” he agreed. “But suppose we can't do it, Lester?”
“Can't do it?” I faltered. “Do you mean”
“I mean that Miss Holladay positively refuses to say where she spent yesterday afternoon.”
“Does she understand the—the necessity?” I asked.
“I pointed it out to her as clearly as I could. I'm all at sea, Lester.”
Well, if even he were beginning to doubt, matters were indeed serious!
“It's incomprehensible!” I sighed, after a moment's confused thought. “But the coachman?”
“The coachman's evidence, I fear, won't help us much—rather the reverse.”
“In that case” I began, and stopped.
“Well, in that case?”
“We must find some other way out,” I concluded lamely.
“Is there another way, Lester?” he demanded, wheeling round upon me fiercely. “Is there another way? If there is, I wish you'd show it to me!”
“There must be!” I protested desperately, striving to convince myself. “There must be; only, I fear, it will take some little time to find.”
“And, meanwhile, Miss Holladay will be remanded! Think what that will mean to her, Lester!”
I had thought. I was desperate as he—but to find the flaw, the weak spot in the chain, required, I felt, a better brain than mine. I was lost in a whirlwind of perplexities.
“Well, we must do our best,” he went on more calmly, after a moment. “I haven't lost hope yet—chance often directs these things.”
A few moments later the room began to fill again. Goldberg and the district attorney came in together, and the former rapped for order.
“The inquest will continue,” he said, “with the examination of John Brooks, Miss Holladay's chauffeur.”
I can give his evidence in two words. His mistress had driven directly down the avenue to Washington Square. There she had left the car, bidding him wait for her, and had continued southward into the squalid French quarter. He had lost sight of her in a moment, and had driven slowly about for more than two hours before she reappeared. She had ordered him to drive home as rapidly as he could, and he had not stopped until he reached the house. Her gown? Yes, he had noticed that it was dark red. He had not seen her face, for it was veiled. No, he had never before driven her to that locality.
Quaking at heart, I realized that only one person could extricate Frances Holladay from the coil woven about her. If she persisted in silence, there was no hope for her.
“That is all,” said the medical examiner. “Will you cross-examine the witness, Mr. Royce?”
My chief shook his head silently, and Brooks left the stand.
Again Goldberg and Singleton whispered together.
“We will recall Miss Holladay's maid,” said the former.
“Are your mistress' handkerchiefs marked in any way?” Goldberg asked, as she turned to him.
“Some of them are marked with her initials, in the form of a monogram. Most of them are plain.”
“Do you recognize this one?” and he handed her the piece of evidence.
I held my breath while the woman looked it over, turning it with trembling fingers.
“No, sir!” she replied emphatically, as she returned it to him.
“Does your mistress possess any handkerchiefs that resemble this one?”
“Oh, yes, sir; it's an ordinary handkerchief of good quality such as most ladies use.”
I breathed a long sigh of relief; here, at least, fortune favored us.
“That is all. Have you any questions, Mr. Royce?”
Again our junior shook his head.
“That concludes our case,” added the medical examiner. “Have you any witnesses to summon, sir?”
What witnesses could we have? Only one—and I fancied that the jurymen were looking at us expectantly. If Miss Holladay were innocent, would she not naturally wish to speak in her own behalf? Did not her very unwillingness to speak tell against her?
“Ask for a recess,” I whispered. “Go to Miss Holladay, and tell her that she must testify.”
But before Mr. Royce could answer, a policeman pushed his way forward from the rear of the room and handed a note to Doctor Goldberg.
“It's for you, Mr. Royce,” he said.
I saw that the address read:
For Mr. Royce,
Attorney for the Defense.
He tore it open, and ran his eyes rapidly over the inclosure. He read it through a second time, then held out the paper to me with an expression of the blankest amazement. The note read:
The man Rogers is lying. The woman who was with Holladay wore a gown of dark green.