The Twenty-Six Clues/Chapter 16
CHAPTER XVI
"It Was Not My Doing"
McCARTY ushered his unexpected guests up the stairs to his sitting-room and hid his amazement beneath a bustling effort to make them comfortable.
"By Jove, you do yourself well here, don't you?" Vivaseur glanced about him at the array of books and cigar boxes, the huge desk, the phonograph in the corner, the shabby, capacious leather chairs drawn up before the grate in which a bed of coals glowed redly, and the soft gray tones of the single picture which hung above. "That is a very good print you have there, McCarty, but I should have fancied your taste ran to a more sporting trend."
There was a shade of patronage in his voice and McCarty replied with dignity:
"'Tis a picture of his mother by a guy called Whistler and I bought it because it minded me of my own, God rest her soul. I am not a sporting man, Mr. Vivaseur. Since I resigned from the force I've done nothing more exciting than a bit of fishing now and then." He turned to the young girl. "What did you want of me, miss? I'll be glad to do anything I can."
"I don't know quite how to begin." Joan Norwood sat twisting the gold chain of her purse nervously between her fingers. "Uncle Cal has talked so much of you that I thought you would be the one to come to"
"Perhaps I can tell you what is on Miss Norwood's mind," Vivaseur interrupted quickly. The momentary patronage was gone from his tones and he spoke with tactful deference. "We came to you because of your influence with the authorities and because Miss Norwood feels, as I do, that if anyone succeeds in solving the mystery of her friend's tragic death, it will be you, my dear fellow!"
"I'm not on the case, sir," McCarty responded quietly. "I've no longer any connection with the force, as you know, and it's little the influence I have there."
"But we know your record!" Vivaseur's smile was winning in its frank, boyish admiration. "Mr. Norwood has told us of your ripping work on a case only last year, and Miss Norwood felt that if you would interest yourself in this affair you would stand a greater show of success than that scientific johnny. He's been about messing things up generally to-day and the old gentleman is in a fearful heat about it."
"Inspector Druet has charge of the investigation," McCarty remarked in a slightly mollified voice.
"Yes. Quite so." Vivaseur shrugged. "I don't want to cast any aspersions on your late profession, McCarty, but after all it is the individual and not the system that counts, don't you think? Your very conscientious Inspector is raising the deuce with all of us, and one of Miss Norwood's motives in coming to you was to enlist your influence to have this espionage to which we are being subjected modified a trifle. I have no personal objection, though, by Jove! I wish they'd be a bit more subtle in their methods. All the chaps at the club are spoofing me about the johnny who is trailing me. However, it is a serious annoyance to Miss Norwood and her uncle and we fancied if you put in a word"
McCarty shook his head.
"That's the ordinary routine work of the department, sir, in a case like this. I couldn't interfere, but likely the Inspector will put a stop to it himself soon, for he told me only yesterday that he expected nothing from it."
Miss Norwood leaned forward in her chair.
"That isn't the real reason why I persuaded Mr. Vivaseur to bring me here to-day, Mr. McCarty," she said earnestly. "Of course, this being followed about is annoying and makes Uncle Cal very difficult to live with, but I wouldn't mind anything if I could only feel that some progress was being made in the investigation, if only we could know who really killed poor Evelyn Jarvis. Oliver has the utmost faith in Mr. Terhune, but his suspicion of Captain Marchal is unjust and utterly without foundation. It is almost cowardly to attack a person in the Captain's position, suffering as he is under such a terrible affliction and absolutely innocent! I had hoped that the authorities would make some headway, but they seem even more willfully blind than Mr. Terhune. Inspector Druet is actually trying to build up a case against Oliver Jarvis himself! They are both dreadfully wrong and the thought that precious time is passing, and that the fiend who killed my friend may escape scot free is driving me almost frantic! I loved Evelyn as if she were my own sister and I shall not rest until her murderer is discovered and brought to justice!"
"He will be," McCarty announced with a certain grimness. "Of course, Mr. Terhune is a very celebrated man, but his methods are not those of the department and naturally I've more faith in the old system. The Inspector may be on the wrong track, but he'll never give up until he learns the truth, I'll say that for him."
"And then it may be too late!" Miss Norwood wrung her hands. "Mr. McCarty, I know you have retired, that you're a private citizen now, but that leaves you all the more free to conduct an investigation of your own, if you only will do so. I've come to ask you to undertake it for me. I can never be happy again while this horrible thought hangs over me, and I know how clever you are; I know that if anyone can find Evelyn's murderer, you can! There will be no difficulty about money, I—I have a great deal, and I would cheerfully give half I possess to learn the truth."
"It's not money that would tempt me to get in the game again, Miss Norwood," McCarty responded gravely. "I've had an interest in the case from the start and I'm of the same opinion as yourself; that both Mr. Terhune and the Inspector are barking up the wrong trees. However, I would not take up the case as a professional matter, though I thank you kindly for the offer. I'm a has-been, and I'll not be setting up shop in competition with Mr. Terhune and the department, but it just happens that I've a private reason for wanting to see this thing through. There's a matter of personal satisfaction in it and I may as well tell you that I've already decided to investigate it on my own account, miss, and I'll no more quit than Inspector Druet himself until I've come at the truth, if it's within the power of mortal man."
"Good!" Vivaseur exclaimed, his face alight with enthusiasm as he extended his hand. "You're a chap after my own heart, McCarty! This will be a load off Miss Norwood's mind, and if I can do anything to help, you may count on me. I'm an awful duffer, I'm afraid, at this sort of thing, for it's a bit out of my line; crime, and all that, but I'll be glad to give you a hand if you'll call on me."
"You are really going to do it?" Miss Norwood breathed. "I can't tell you how thankful I am, Mr. McCarty, and relieved, too, that you don't suspect either Captain Marchal or Mr, Jarvis, for now I can speak freely. There is so much going on at home that I don't understand, something queer in the attitude of nearly everybody, and I don't know what to think. Perhaps if I tell you, you will be able to make something of it. There are other points, too; little things I remember about Evelyn, chance remarks that puzzled me at the time and come back to me now with redoubled significance."
"I wish you would tell me, Miss Norwood." McCarty hitched his chair closer. "'Twill be a great help, and if you and Mr. Vivaseur will both keep your eyes open and let me know what happens you may go a long way toward discovering the truth. Now, what is it that's going on at your home? What's bothering you in the manner of everybody?"
"Well, to begin with, there's Uncle Cal," she replied. "He was dreadfully excited last night, but I supposed it was the reaction from the funeral and his indignation at being followed about. He ate scarcely any dinner, and after Mr. Vivaseur had gone I heard him talking to himself in the library. I went in to him, but he sent me off to bed as though I were a little girl again. Hours after I wakened and felt uneasy, I don't know why. It must have been terribly late, nearly morning. I saw a light downstairs and crept down, and what do you think I found Uncle Cal doing? Upsetting his whole museum! Everything was topsy-turvy and he was in the midst of it, ransacking drawers and turning the contents of the cases out upon the floor in a hopeless jumble. He was so absorbed that he never heard me, and I tip-toed back to my room without disturbing him.
"This morning the museum door was locked and Uncle Cal looked quite worn out; dazed, too, as though he had had a shock of some sort. He was full of enthusiasm before the investigation, and could talk of nothing else, but now he refuses to discuss it and seems to shrink if it is mentioned in his presence. I can't help feeling that he knows or suspects something, but he acts almost afraid to speak."
McCarty nodded slowly.
"I've a notion that I know what's troubling him," he commented. "But go on, miss. There was something else"
"Captain Marchal," she paused. "You know how ill he was yesterday; he seems to be quite himself again to-day, but terribly weak and shaken, and his manner is so constrained and queer that even Mr. Vivaseur noticed it and he has never had even five minutes' conversation with him."
"Rather!" the Englishman ejaculated. "Of course, I admire him tremendously and all that for what he has done, and I'm no end sorry for him in his affliction, but my word! he is an uncomfortable sort of chap to have about! He has his ears cocked, if you know what I mean, as if he were listening to something no one else can hear, and those sightless eyes of his seem to follow one about in the most extraordinary way. Gives one a deucedly odd sensation, don't you know."
"I believe you, sir!" McCarty responded with emphasis. "Did he know 'twas me sat with him yesterday, I wonder?"
"Yes. Uncle Cal told him and he seemed to be rather annoyed about it, and anxious to know if he had given you any trouble," Joan Norwood responded. "Then Mr. Terhune came and insisted upon seeing him this morning. They had an interview in the drawing-room and I think Mr. Terhune must havp virtually accused him, for I saw Uncle Cal listening in the hall and all at once he burst in upon them and there was a fearful row, he defending Captain Marchal and abusing Mr. Terhune in the most violent manner and finally ordering him out of the house. After he had gone Uncle Cal persuaded the Captain to go to bed and rest, and he did look frightfully ill when I passed him on the stairs, but he pulled himself together and came down again at lunch time, although he ate nothing. I can feel his queer, strained attitude, just as Mr. Vivaseur can, and although his manners are perfect, as always, it makes me uncomfortable, ill at ease. He was never like this before. Then, right after lunch, the worst thing happened of all."
"And what was that?" McCarty asked eagerly.
"Oliver Jarvis came and said that he expected to be arrested for the murder himself! That Inspector Druet had been questioning him in such a way he could not help but realize he was suspected, preposterous as it appeared, and he wanted Uncle Cal to arrange his affairs for him in the event of his being taken into custody. We all thought he was crazy at first, that his grief had affected his mind, but he told us enough to convince us the Inspector was actually laboring under the delusion that he had killed poor Evelyn. You see, they have discovered a discrepancy in his story of where and how he spent Friday afternoon. He had told them that he went directly from his attorneys to the French consulate, when, as a matter of fact, there was an interval of an hour and a half just at the time when the murder is supposed to have taken place, which he said nothing about."
"Why doesn't he tell the truth now?" McCarty spoke with studied carelessness.
"Because it would make the case look even blacker against him, in the Inspector's eyes." Miss Norwood hesitated and then went on quickly: "You see, they've discovered that he went back to his house that afternoon; someone saw him leave and take a taxi to the consulate. If he admitted now that he had quarreled with his wife"
"Quarreled with her?" McCarty ejaculated.
"Yes. That is what has made his grief so difficult to bear, poor boy, and he simply couldn't speak of it to anyone before. It was just a tiny quarrel, but the thought that they parted in coolness after five years of ideal happiness is driving him almost mad! It was about money, too. Oliver has lost a huge amount in the last year or two on the stock market, and some of it was his wife's. She knew, of course, and never blamed him, but she was almost fanatical about this reconstruction work in France, and wanted to throw nearly all of her remaining capital into it. Oliver did not think it wise, under the circumstances, and they had a final argument about it on Friday after lunch. Oliver says he kissed her good-by, but it was a cold sort of kiss and she did not respond. It worried him all during his interview with his attorneys and afterward he went up and walked in the park and fought it out with himself.
"He told us that his first impulse was to give way to her wishes, but his recent experiences in Wall Street had shaken his confidence in himself and his ability to make money, and common sense dictated that his wife's fortune must be conserved; that she must be protected and provided for, even against her quixotic desires. He longed to make up with her, though, and started home, but in the very vestibule of the house he stopped himself, afraid lest in his softened mood if she pleaded with him he would give in to her against his better judgment. If the person who saw him apparently coming out of his house had been watching a minute or two earlier, they would have seen him arrive, pause in the vestibule and then turn and go down the steps and away. That is the truth, Mr. McCarty, but you can realize what little hope he would have of convincing Inspector Druet of it."
A sound note remotely resembling a chuckle issued from McCarty's lips, but the next moment his gravity had returned.
"Not now, maybe, but I don't think there's danger of his arrest; not right away, at least. The Inspector is cautious by nature, and he'll not risk charging Mr. Jarvis with the murder till he's got more evidence than that to go upon. I don't know but I'd tell the truth, at that, if I was Mr. Jarvis. It'll give the Inspector something to think about and if it could be proved to him that Mrs. Jarvis knew of her husband's speculations and the loss of her money the theory he's been working on would be knocked into a cocked hat."
"Oh, do you think so?" Miss Norwood cried. "I'll tell him! Mr. Terhune advised him to admit nothing, but privately I think that is just because he is sure of his own case and wants to make his truimph all the more effective by permitting the police to blunder, no matter what mental anguish it causes his client."
This time McCarty's chuckle was unrestrained.
"A grand-stand play! 'Tis like him!" he affirmed. "However, miss, if you can persuade Mr. Jarvis to go straight to Inspector Druet with his story, just as you've told it to me, 'twill be better for him in the end. Tell him to be sure and explain how he lost the money and Mrs. Jarvis not blaming him, and to say that it's by McCarty's advice he's making a clean breast of it. I've small influence, as I told you, but the Inspector knows me and he'll at least take the trouble to investigate before he goes any further."
"I can persuade Oliver, I am sure." Miss Norwood's voice was buoyant with relief, but her expression changed swiftly as she added: "Now I want to tell you about Evelyn herself, Mr. McCarty. My uncle told me about the cake marked 'Noel' and the macaroni-paste letters which were found hidden in her room, but I suspected even before the cake could have been sent to her that there was some old trouble in her life that clouded her happiness, and last spring I was almost certain, from something she let foil in an unguarded moment, that she was being hounded by someone but I did not think of blackmail. Remember that I was closer to her than anyone in the world except her husband; possibly even more in her confidence in some ways, for she did not feel the need of so much self-repression with me.
"I cannot recall the moment when I first began to suspect that Evelyn had some secret trouble, but I found her sad and depressed often in the past few years without any apparent cause, and one subject seemed forever back of her mind, predominant over everything else; how alone each one of us stood in this world no matter how much love we were surrounded with, and the martyrdom of being unable to reveal oneself fully. I thought at first that it was just a morbid mood, but it recurred so persistently that at length I begged her to tell me what was troubling her. She broke down and cried terribly, but it seemed to relieve her and she put me off with vague excuses.
"That was some time before the holidays last year, but immediately after Christmas I noticed the change in her. She was afraid, Mr. McCarty; I did not know of what, but she lived in a constant state of nervous apprehension which increased as time went on until she became actually ill. That was in May, I think. I was sitting with her one day when she fell into a little doze and then started up in terror. "Go away!" she cried, flinging her hands out as if to ward off something. "It was not my doing! Must the shadow of it follow me always, always!"
"I spoke to her and she quieted at once and murmured something about a bad dream but she could not deceive me. The hunted look in her eyes was too real and it was the same look, only intensified, that I had seen for months past."
Eric Vivaseur stirred in his chair.
"Don't you think, my dear girl, that you may be exaggerating a trifle?" he suggested. "Isn't it because of what has come to light now, don't you know, that you attach too much significance to it? That whole affair of the cake and those letters is a bit thick, really! I should fancy it was some sort of bally practical joke, if you know what I mean. A blackmailing johnny in real life wouldn't go about it in such a silly fashion, now would he? It simply isn't done, you know."
He appealed to McCarty, but the latter shook his head.
"There's stranger things than that pulled off, sir," he remarked. "I'm afraid there's no doubt of it that Mrs. Jarvis was being blackmailed, and 'twas far from being a joke!"
"But on what score?" the other demanded. "I say, have you any idea, McCarty, of what possible secret could be in the lady's life? From what I have heard of her, she seems to have been quite all right. Have you discovered the slightest shadow on her past?"
McCarty regarded the Englishman meditatively for a moment and then replied with an assumption of candor.
"No, Mr. Vivaseur. I've no notion of what it could be but I'm going to do my best to find out."
"I am sure you will." Miss Norwood rose and held out her hand. "I feel so relieved at having had this talk with you, Mr. McCarty, and to hear that you mean to carry on the investigation. I know that you will succeed, you will learn the truth; and we shall welcome it whatever it brings."
"I'll try hard enough," McCarty assured her. "You'll let me know, miss, if anything else happens?"
She promised and they departed, McCarty following his guests to the head of the stairs.
"I say, here's a letter for you." Vivaseur called back from below. "I'll toss it up to you—Ah! Sorry it fell short! Good-afternoon."
When the door had closed behind them McCarty picked up his letter and returned to the sitting-room, where he dropped into a chair and sat for long buried in deep cogitation. Miss Norwood's story had not wholly surprised him, but with its termination a thought had come which, wildly improbable as his earlier inspirations had been, yet held him fascinated by its sheer audacity.
Dusk had fallen when he at last remembered the letter in his hands, and stirring up the dying coals upon the hearth, he tore open the envelope.
"Deer Mr. McCarty," he read. "Are you busy tonight? I will be at the basment door at half past 8. I am in troubel. Yours truly, Etta."