The Marathon Mystery/Part 1/Chapter 8

CHAPTER VIII

The fog Thickens

THE coroner’s court was crowded, as it always is at any hearing presenting features of morbid or sensational interest, and Goldberg, with an inborn love of the theatric, arranged his witnesses so as to lead gradually to the climax, the dénouement. He put the janitor on the stand first, and then had Simmonds tell his story. Some medical testimony followed as to the exact nature of Thompson’s injuries, and the bullet, which had been extracted, was put in evidence—it was plainly much too large to have come from Miss Croydon’s pistol. Finally, Miss Croydon herself was called. A little gasp of delicious excitement ran through the crowd as she appeared at the door of the witness room. Here was a titbit to touch the palates of even the jaded police reporters.

Godfrey, looking at her as she came steadily forward to the stand, felt his heart warm with admiration. She seemed perfectly composed, and if not perfectly at ease, at least as nearly so as any woman of her position could be in such a place. Godfrey was pleased to see Drysdale in close attendance, and he nodded to him encouragingly.

Miss Croydon told her story clearly and with an accent of sincerity there was no doubting. It differed in one detail from the story she had told the night before. Thompson, she said, had perceived the intruder and there had been a short, fierce struggle before he fell under the blow of the pipe. He was not unconscious, but was struggling to his feet again, when his assailant shot him.

Jury, coroner, reporters listened with close attention. Godfrey watched her with a grim little smile at her superb assurance, her perfect poise. Then he glanced at the jury and smiled again as he noted their seriously respectful faces. When she had finished, Goldberg began a brief examination.

“That is not precisely the story you told last night, Miss Croydon,” he suggested.

“No,” she said; “no--I was too startled, then, too over-wrought to think quite clearly. This morning I endeavoured to recall exactly what occurred.”

“And you believe that you have succeeded?”

“Yes, sir; I am sure of it.”

“You would say, then, I suppose, that the deceased had been killed in self-defence.”

“I am not familiar with the niceties of the law, sir,” she answered steadily.

“But there was a struggle?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And the deceased was endeavouring to inflict some injury upon his adversary?”

“He was doing his best to do so, I should say, sir.”

The coroner paused for a moment and glanced at the jury, but none of them seemed disposed to ask any questions. Then Goldberg made a sign to Simmonds. He left the room, but reappeared in a moment, leading in Jimmy the Dude.

Not until they were quite near did Miss Croydon perceive them; then, as her eyes met the prisoner’s, she half started from her chair, her face like marble. As for Jimmy, Godfrey was astonished to perceive the fascinated gaze he bent upon Miss Croydon. What was the connection between them? Where could they possibly have met? Was Jimmy guilty, after all? Certainly Simmonds had no longer any doubt of it, to judge by his beatific expression of countenance.

It was over in an instant—Miss Croydon gripped back her self-control and the prisoner managed to remove his eyes from her; but Goldberg had perceived their agitation, and the gaze he bent upon the witness grew perceptibly more stern.

“Miss Croydon,” he began, “you have described the guilty man as short and heavy-set with a dark moustache turning up at the ends. Look at the prisoner before you—is he the man?”

“He is not,” replied the witness in a firm voice and without an instant’s hesitation.

Jimmy was again watching her with expressive eyes.

“You are sure?”

“Perfectly sure; there is little or no resemblance.”

“You do not know the prisoner?”

“No, sir; I have never before seen him.”

“He was talking with the janitor last night when you entered the Marathon.”

“I had on a heavy veil at the time and could not see distinctly.”

The answers came promptly, calmly. Goldberg hesitated and glanced at Simmonds’s crestfallen, face. Was he justified in pushing her further? He glanced at her again from under half-closed lashes, and her imperious beauty did its work.

“That is all,” he said abruptly. “You may go, Miss Croydon.”

Godfrey watched her as she lowered her veil, rose, stepped down, and took Drysdale’s arm. She had carried it off well, exceedingly well. Her attitude had been so frank, so candid, so openly sincere that he himself was almost convinced by it. But for that instant’s agitation when she first received the prisoner, he would have been quite convinced. She had told her story and answered Goldberg’s questions with clear cheek and steady eye—with a directness which had plainly carried great weight with the jury. Wonderful was the adjective which Godfrey used in describing her to himself.

But what had that instant’s agitation meant? Was Jimmy really guilty? Was she trying to shield him, out of gratitude, perhaps, for defending her? Had Jimmy risen to that height of chivalry? See with what a fascinated gaze he was watching her now!

She passed from sight, the door closed, and he leaned back in his chair to hear Jimmy tell a smooth story of his doings the night before. Magraw and half a dozen others confirmed the tale; it was a really good alibi, carefully arranged; there was nothing to disprove it, and at the end, the jury, without retiring, handed in the usual verdict of death at the hands of a person unknown.

When it was over, Simmonds crooked at Godfrey an inviting finger, and together they went down to the detective’s private office.

“Sit down,” said Simmonds; “I want to talk to you. We’re up against a tough proposition.”

Godfrey sat down and looked at him.

“Yes, we are,” he agreed.

“What do you think of it?”

“I’m more inclined to think Jimmy guilty than I was last night.”

“You saw, then, that she was trying to protect him?” asked Simmonds eagerly.

“I saw there was some understanding between them. Don’t let your theory of Jimmy’s guilt carry you away. Besides, there’s a good deal to say on the other side. There wasn’t enough finish about it to look like Jimmy. He’d think a long time before he killed a man with a third person looking on.”

“But if it was self-defence?”

Godfrey raised his eyebrows expressively.

“I think she was drawing the long bow myself,” agreed Simmonds, quickly; “and there can be only one reason for it—she’s trying to protect Jimmy, or whoever it was killed Thompson. It was Jimmy, I tell you—he was jealous of her——”

“Oh, nonsense!” interrupted Godfrey impatiently. “A love affair between those two! You’ve been reading French romances, Simmonds!”

“Maybe I have; but I’ve run across stranger things than that right here in New York. This is a bad snarl, any way you look at it. Here’s a point, now—how could Thompson, who was dead drunk at seven o’clock, be wide awake at eight? How could he have heard Miss Croydon’s knock?”

“Maybe it wasn’t Thompson who opened the door.”

"But Miss Croydon entered without hesitation. The man who opened the door must've been the one she expected to see. You'll remember, she asked for Thompson."

"Well, whoever it was," Godfrey pointed out, "it wasn't Jimmy. He couldn't have beaten the elevator upstairs."

"No," admitted Simmonds helplessly, "he couldn't. But let me point out one thing—whoever got into Thompson's rooms had his key. There was nobody there when Higgins put Thompson to bed; Higgins locked the door when he came out; Thompson’s windows were all locked on the inside and the transom was bolted. Now if Jimmy didn't have the key, who did?"

"I don't know," said Godfrey. "But we'll never arrive anywhere if we keep tangling ourselves up this way. Who is Thompson? The first thing we've got to do is to establish his identity. Then, maybe, we can make a guess at the rest of the story."

"Of course; I saw that at once. But a queer thing is that we can't find out a thing about Thompson. Last night was the first time he'd ever been seen at Magraw's—nobody there'd ever seen him before. He spent three or four dollars treating the crowd. Then he got noisy and Magraw was going to call the police, but Jimmy spoke up and said he'd look after him. His story was straight that far."

"Have you gone through Thompson's belongings?"

"Here they are," and Simmonds brought out a canvas bag and opened it. "Look at them."

Godfrey turned out the contents and examined them piece by piece. It was merely a lot of ordinary clothing, most of it much the worse for wear and all of it strongly impregnated with the odour of tobacco.

"Anything in the pockets?" asked Godfrey.

"Not a thing except some loose smoking tobacco. There's one thing about the clothing, though—have you noticed? It's all summer clothing; see these linen trousers, now."

Godfrey nodded, with drawn brows.

"What's this?" he asked suddenly, holding up a swart object, shaped like a clam-shell and halving in the same way along the sharp edge.

"I don’t know. A curio picked up at sea somewheres, perhaps. I have a theory that Thompson was a sailor.”

"Why?"

"Well, the bag, in the first place—only a sailor would carry his clothes that way. Then, put your head down in it and, under the tobacco, you'll smell the salt."

Godfrey sniffed and nodded again. Then he got out his knife.

"Let's take a look at the inside of Mr. Thompson's curio," he said, and inserted the blade.

A twist and the sides unclosed. Simmonds sprang back with a sharp cry of surprise as he saw what lay within, and even Godfrey’s heart gave a sudden leap.

For there, coiled thrice upon itself, lay a little viper, with venomous, triangular head.

Then, in an instant, Godfrey smiled.

"It's not alive," he said. "Don't you see, it's some marvellous kind of nut."

Simmonds approached cautiously and took another look.

“A nut?” he repeated. “A nut? Well, that beats me!”

And well it might, for in every detail the form was perfect. Godfrey looked at it musingly.

“This may give us a clew,” he said. “I shouldn’t imagine a nut like this grows in many parts of the world. Though, of course, a sailor might pick it up anywhere—from another sailor, in a slop-shop, even here in New York, perhaps.”

He closed the shell together again and placed it in the bag, stuffing the rest of the clothing in after it.

“Thompson had no very exalted idea of cleanliness,” he remarked. “His clothing needs a visit to the laundry. And this is all?”

“Yes—he’d rented his furniture from a store down the street. He had to pay his rent in advance because he had so little baggage. That receipt’s the only thing that’s got his name on it—oh, yes; there’s a letter tattooed on his left arm, but it’s not a T—it’s a J.”

“Which goes to show that his name wasn’t Thompson. I think you’re right, Simmonds, in putting him down as a sailor. I thought so last night—in fact, I’ve already got two men making a tour of the docks trying to find somebody who knew him.”

“Have you?” said Simmonds, smiling. “That’s like you. There’s another curious thing, though, about the clothing he had on.”

“What is that?”

“Some of ifs marked with one initial, some with another. Not one piece is marked with his.”

“That is queer,” commented Godfrey; “but it isn’t half so queer as another thing. Why should a sailor, a drunkard, without a decent suit of clothes, rent an apartment that costs him forty dollars a month, when he could get a room for a dollar a week down on the Bowery, his natural stamping ground?”

Simmonds nodded helplessly.

“That’s so,” he said.

“Unless,” added Godfrey, “he thought he had to have some such place to work from. He could hardly have asked Miss Croydon to meet him in a Bowery lodging house.”

“No,” agreed Simmonds; “but he needn’t have blown in forty dollars, either. He could ’a’ got a nice room ‘most anywhere uptown for five a week——”

A tap at the door interrupted him.

“Come in,” he called.

The door opened and the coroner’s clerk entered.

“Mr. Goldberg sent the exhibits back to you,” he said, holding out a parcel to Simmonds.

Simmonds opened it and took out a pocket-book, a pipe, a knife, and some silver money.

“All right,” he said, and signed a receipt.

Godfrey waited until the door closed, then he rose and came over to Simmonds’s side.

“There’s something here that might help us,” he said, picking up the pocket-book. “Those clippings—why, they’re not here!”

Simmonds smiled drily.

“That’s another thing I wanted to tell you. The clippings have been removed.”

“Removed? By whom?”

“That’s a question. They were removed some time between the moment we looked at them and the moment the coroner took charge.”

Godfrey stared at him with startled eyes.

“You remember,” Simmonds continued, “that after we looked at the pocket-book, I put it back in Thompson’s pocket.”

“Yes—I saw you do that.”

“We then went into the bedroom, and had a look around, leaving the body alone——”

“With Miss Croydon,” said Godfrey, completing the sentence.

“Precisely. Goldberg arrived a minute or two later. Then he and I searched the body again. When he opened the pocket-book there was nothing in it except the rent receipt.”

Godfrey sat down again in his chair. The inference was obvious, irresistible. The clippings had been removed by Miss Croydon—they were the papers she had risked so much to get possession of. Simmonds and he had had the secret under their hands and had missed it! It was not a pleasant reflection.

His thoughts flew back to Miss Croydon, and he found himself again admiring her. To have taken the clippings demanded a degree of bravery, of self-control, amounting almost to callousness. It seemed incredible that she should have dared approach the body, open the coat…

Then he remembered her half-fainting attitude when he had returned from the inner room. At the time, he had thought the collapse natural enough. Now, it took on a new meaning.

“There’s another thing,” continued Simmonds, after a moment. “Here’s the piece of pipe we found on the floor. Do you know where it came from?”

“No—I was going to look that up.”

“It came from the radiator. The connections were defective and a plumber was replacing them. This is a piece of pipe he had removed and left lying behind the radiator. He remembers it distinctly. Do you recall the position of the radiator?”

“Yes; it’s against the wall opposite the bedroom door.”

“Exactly. Then the person coming from that door must have crossed the room to get it. More than that, he must have hunted for it or known it was there, because it was in the shadow behind the radiator. It couldn’t be seen unless one looked for it—I’ve tried it.”

Godfrey paused to consider.

“Did you give these points to Goldberg?” he asked.

“No; I didn’t think it would help matters any; besides, I didn’t want to put Miss Croydon on her guard.”

“Of course—though all this doesn’t actually implicate her.”

“No; but it shows she knows more than she’s told us,” said Simmonds doggedly. “I don’t think she’s been square with us.”

Godfrey did not permit any trace of his inward perturbation to appear on his countenance; nevertheless he was seriously disturbed. He had hoped that no one but himself would suspect Miss Croydon’s lack of frankness. He felt a certain irritation against her—she should have been more careful; she should have foreseen that the clippings would be traced to her. She was relying too much on his forbearance. He must do his best to control Simmonds.

“Well, perhaps she hasn’t,” he said slowly, after a moment; “but maybe she’s not so much to blame for that, after all. Anyway, we’ve got to work at the case from the other end. We’ve got to identify Thompson first.”

“Yes,” agreed Simmonds; “that’s our best hold. You’ll let me know if you find out anything?”

“Of course,” said Godfrey, rising, and with a curt nod he went out and down the steps to the street.

At the office he found two reports awaiting him. One was from the men he had sent along the docks—they had found no one who could identify the photograph of Thompson. The other was from Delaney, the head of the Record’s intelligence department. At two o’clock that morning, just before retiring, Godfrey had ’phoned a message to the office:

 

“Delaney-I want all the information obtainable concerning the history of the Croydon family, to which Mrs. Richard Delroy and Grace Croydon belong.”

 

This was the result:

 

“Gustave Croydon, notary and money-lender, No. 17 Rue d’Antin, Paris, removed with wife and young daughter about 1878, to Beckenham, just south of London, England. Why he removed from France not known. Rue d’Antin has been completely rebuilt within last thirty years and only person there now who remembers Croydon is an old notary named Fabre, who has an office at the corner of Rue St. Augustin. He has vague memory that Croydon left France to avoid criminal prosecution of some sort.

“Croydon bought small country place near Beckenham and lived there quietly in semi-retirement. Fortune apparently not large. In 1891, mortgaged estate for £2000; mortgage paid in 1897. Religion, Catholic. Excellent reputation at Beckenham.

“Eldest daughter, Edith, born in France, August 26, 1874. Educated at school there, but broke down from over-study and returned to Beckenham, where she became interested in social settlement work. There met Richard Delroy, New York, who was making investigation of London charities. Married him June 6, 1900, and went immediately to New York.

“Only other child, younger daughter Grace, born at Beckenham, May 12, 1880. Educated at home. No unusual incidents in life, so far as known.

“Croydon and wife died typhoid fever, 1901. Delroys came to England, and, after selling property and settling estate, took Grace home with them. Estate, left wholly to younger sister, paid inheritance tax on £7500.”

 

Godfrey read this through slowly, dwelling upon it point by point.

“The skeleton,” he said to himself, “is pretty plain—it lies concealed somewhere behind Croydon’s departure from France. There must have been some unusual reason for that—a reason even more serious, perhaps, than this threatened prosecution—the clippings would tell the story.

“But is it worth while trying to dig it up? It wouldn’t be a difficult thing to do if the newspapers handled it at the time; but I don’t know,” and he stared out through his window with drawn brows. “If it’s buried again, I believe I’ll let it rest—for the present, anyway,” and he whirled back to his desk.

He wrote the story of the day’s developments and turned it in.

“We’ve been lucky,” said the city editor, with a gleeful smile, as he took the copy. “We’ve got photographs of all the principals.”

“Have we?”

“Yes—they cost $500, but they’re worth it. No other paper in town will have ’em.”

“That’s good,” said Godfrey, but it was a half-hearted commendation, and he left the office in a frame of mind not wholly amiable. The methods of a popular newspaper are not always above reproach.

“Thank Heaven,” he added to himself, his face clearing a little, “there’s nothing in my story to implicate either Miss Croydon or Mrs. Delroy—there’s no hint of the skeleton! I took care of that—which,” he concluded, with a grim smile, “is mighty forbearing in a yellow journalist!”

What further tests there were to be of his forbearance not even he suspected!