The Mystery & Suspense Novella

by Fletcher Flora

  “Always in daytime—usually about noon,” said Bill from his corner.

  “Any other entrance to the basement except this way—and you could see anyone coming here this way I suppose?”

  “Sure I could see ’em. There’s no other entrance to the cellar except the coal hole in the sidewalk in front.”

  “Two big electric lights in front of the building, aren’t there?”

  “Yes. They go all night.”

  A slightly puzzled expression crept into the eyes of The Thinking Machine. Hatch knew from the persistency of the questions that he was not satisfied; yet he was not able to fathom or to understand all the queries. In some way they had to do with the possibility of some one having access to the meter.

  “Where do you usually sit at night here?” was the next question.

  “Over there where Bill’s sitting. I always sit there.”

  The Thinking Machine crossed the room to Bill, a typical, grimy-handed man of his class.

  “May I sit there a moment?” he asked.

  Bill arose lazily, and The Thinking Machine sank down into the chair. From this point he could see plainly through the opening into the basement proper—there was no door—the gas meter of enormous proportions through which all the gas in the house passed. An electric light in the door made it bright as daylight. The Thinking Machine noted these things, arose, nodded his thanks to the two men and, still with the puzzled expression on his face, led the way upstairs. There the manager was still in his office.

  “I presume you examine and know that the time check in the engineer’s room is properly punched every half-hour during the night?” he asked.

  “Yes. I examine the dial every day—have them here, in fact, each with the date on it.”

  “May I see them?”

  Now the manager was puzzled. He produced the cards, one for each day, and for half an hour The Thinking Machine studied them minutely. At the end of that time, when he arose and Hatch looked at him inquiringly, he saw still the perplexed expression.

  After urgent solicitation, the manager admitted them to the apartments of Weldon Henley. Mr. Henley himself had gone to his office in State Street. Here The Thinking Machine did several things which aroused the curiosity of the manager, one of which was to minutely study the gas jets. Then The Thinking Machine opened one of the front windows and glanced out into the street. Below fifteen feet was the sidewalk; above was the solid front of the building, broken only by a flagpole which, properly roped, extended from the hall window of the next floor above out over the sidewalk a distance of twelve feet or so.

  “Ever use that flagpole?” he asked the manager.

  “Rarely,” said the manager. “On holidays sometimes—Fourth of July and such times. We have a big flag for it.”

  From the apartments The Thinking Machine led the way to the hall, up the stairs and to the flagpole. Leaning out of this window, he looked down toward the window of the apartments he had just left. Then he inspected the rope of the flagpole, drawing it through his slender hands slowly and carefully. At last he picked off a slender thread of scarlet and examined it.

  “Ah,” he exclaimed. Then to Hatch: “Let’s go, Mr. Hatch. Thank you,” this last to the manager, who had been a puzzled witness.

  Once on the street, side by side with The Thinking Machine, Hatch was bursting with questions, but he didn’t ask them. He knew it would be useless. At last The Thinking Machine broke the silence.

  “That girl, Miss Regnier, was murdered,” he said suddenly, positively. “There have been four attempts to murder Henley.”

  “How?” asked Hatch, startled.

  “By a scheme so simple that neither you nor I nor the police have ever heard of it being employed,” was the astonishing reply. “It is perfectly horrible in its simplicity.”

  “What was it?” Hatch insisted, eagerly.

  “It would be futile to discuss that now,” was the rejoinder. “There has been murder. We know how. Now the question is—who? What person would have a motive to kill Henley?”

  CHAPTER III

  There was a pause as they walked on.

  “Where are we going?” asked Hatch finally.

  “Come up to my place and let’s consider this matter a bit further,” replied The Thinking Machine.

  Not another word was spoken by either until half an hour later, in the small laboratory. For a long time the scientist was thoughtful—deeply thoughtful. Once he took down a volume from a shelf and Hatch glanced at the title. It was “Gases: Their Properties.” After awhile he returned this to the shelf and took down another, on which the reporter caught the title, “Anatomy.”

  “Now, Mr. Hatch,” said The Thinking Machine in his perpetually crabbed voice, “we have a most remarkable riddle. It gains this remarkable aspect from its very simplicity. It is not, however, necessary to go into that now. I will make it clear to you when we know the motives.

  “As a general rule, the greatest crimes never come to light because the greatest criminals, their perpetrators, are too clever to be caught. Here we have what I might call a great crime committed with a subtle simplicity that is wholly disarming, and a greater crime even than this was planned. This was to murder Weldon Henley. The first thing for you to do is to see Mr. Henley and warn him of his danger. Asphyxiation will not be attempted again, but there is a possibility of poison, a pistol shot, a knife, anything almost. As a matter of fact, he is in great peril.

  “Superficially, the death of Miss Regnier, the maid, looks to be suicide. Instead it is the fruition of a plan which has been tried time and again against Henley. There is a possibility that Miss Regnier was not an intentional victim of the plot, but the fact remains that she was murdered. Why? Find the motive for the plot to murder Mr. Henley and you will know why.”

  The Thinking Machine reached over to the shelf, took a book, looked at it a moment, then went on:

  “The first question to determine positively is: Who hated Weldon Henley sufficiently to desire his death? You say he is a successful man in the Street. Therefore there is a possibility that some enemy there is at the bottom of the affair, yet it seems hardly probable. If by his operations Mr. Henley ever happened to wreck another man’s fortune find this man and find out all about him. He may be the man. There will be innumerable questions arising from this line of inquiry to a man of your resources. Leave none of them unanswered.

  “On the other hand there is Henley’s love affair. Had he a rival who might desire his death? Had he any rival? If so, find out all about him. He may be the man who planned all this. Here, too, there will be questions arising which demand answers. Answer them—all of them—fully and clearly before you see me again.

  “Was Henley ever a party to a liaison of any kind? Find that out, too. A vengeful woman or a discarded sweetheart of a vengeful woman, you know, will go to any extreme. The rumour of his engagement to Miss—Miss—”

  “Miss Lipscomb,” Hatch supplied.

  “The rumour of his engagement to Miss Lipscomb might have caused a woman whom he had once been interested in or who was once interested in him to attempt his life. The subtler murders—that is, the ones which are most attractive as problems—are nearly always the work of a cunning woman. I know nothing about women myself,” he hastened to explain; “but Lombroso has taken that attitude. Therefore, see if there is a woman.”

  Most of these points Hatch had previously seen—seen with the unerring eye of a clever newspaper reporter—yet there were several which had not occurred to him. He nodded his understanding.

  “Now the centre of the affair, of course,” The Thinking Machine continued, “is the apartment house where Henley lives. The person who attempted his life either lives there or has ready access to the place, and frequently spends the night there. This is a vital question for you to answer. I am leaving all this to you because you know better how to
do these things than I do. That’s all, I think. When these things are all learned come back to me.”

  The Thinking Machine arose as if the interview were at an end, and Hatch also arose, reluctantly. An idea was beginning to dawn in his mind.

  “Does it occur to you that there is any connection whatever between Henley and Miss Regnier?” he asked.

  “It is possible,” was the reply. “I had thought of that. If there is a connection it is not apparent yet.”

  “Then how—how was it she—she was killed, or killed herself, whichever may be true, and—”

  “The attempt to kill Henley killed her. That’s all I can say now.”

  “That all?” asked Hatch, after a pause.

  “No. Warn Mr. Henley immediately that he is in grave danger. Remember the person who has planned this will probably go to any extreme. I don’t know Mr. Henley, of course, but from the fact that he always had a light at night I gather that he is a timid sort of man—not necessarily a coward, but a man lacking in stamina—therefore, one who might better disappear for a week or so until the mystery is cleared up. Above all, impress upon him the importance of the warning.”

  The Thinking Machine opened his pocketbook and took from it the scarlet thread which he had picked from the rope of the flagpole.

  “Here, I believe, is the real clew to the problem,” he explained to Hatch. “What does it seem to be?”

  Hatch examined it closely.

  “I should say a strand from a Turkish bath robe,” was his final judgment.

  “Possibly. Ask some cloth expert what he makes of it, then if it sounds promising look into it. Find out if by any possibility it can be any part of any garment worn by any person in the apartment house.”

  “But it’s so slight—” Hatch began.

  “I know,” the other interrupted, tartly. “It’s slight, but I believe it is a part of the wearing apparel of the person, man or woman, who has four times attempted to kill Mr. Henley and who did kill the girl. Therefore, it is important.”

  Hatch looked at him quickly.

  “Well, how—in what manner—did it come where you found it?”

  “Simple enough,” said the scientist. “It is a wonder that there were not more pieces of it—that’s all.”

  Perplexed by his instructions, but confident of results, Hatch left The Thinking Machine. What possible connection could this tiny bit of scarlet thread, found on a flagpole, have with some one shutting off the gas in Henley’s rooms? How did any one go into Henley’s rooms to shut off the gas? How was it Miss Regnier was dead? What was the manner of her death?

  A cloth expert in a great department store turned his knowledge on the tiny bit of scarlet for the illumination of Hatch, but he could go no further than to say that it seemed to be part of a Turkish bath robe.

  “Man or woman’s?” asked Hatch.

  “The material from which bath robes are made is the same for both men and women,” was the reply. “I can say nothing else. Of course there’s not enough of it to even guess at the pattern of the robe.”

  Then Hatch went to the financial district and was ushered into the office of Weldon Henley, a slender, handsome man of thirty-two or three years, pallid of face and nervous in manner. He still showed the effect of the gas poisoning, and there was even a trace of a furtive fear—fear of something, he himself didn’t know what—in his actions.

  Henley talked freely to the newspaper man of certain things, but of other things was resentfully reticent. He admitted his engagement to Miss Lipscomb, and finally even admitted that Miss Lipscomb’s hand had been sought by another man, Reginault Cabell, formerly of Virginia.

  “Could you give me his address?” asked Hatch.

  “He lives in the same apartment house with me—two floors above,” was the reply.

  Hatch was startled; startled more than he would have cared to admit.

  “Are you on friendly terms with him?” he asked.

  “Certainly,” said Henley. “I won’t say anything further about this matter. It would be unwise for obvious reasons.”

  “I suppose you consider that this turning on of the gas was an attempt on your life?”

  “I can’t suppose anything else.”

  Hatch studied the pallid face closely as he asked the next question.

  “Do you know Miss Regnier was found dead today?”

  “Dead?” exclaimed the other, and he arose. “Who—what—who is she?”

  It seemed a distinct effort for him to regain control of himself.

  The reporter detailed then the circumstances of the finding of the girl’s body, and the broker listened without comment. From that time forward all the reporter’s questions were either parried or else met with a flat refusal to answer. Finally Hatch repeated to him the warning which he had from The Thinking Machine, and feeling that he had accomplished little, went away.

  At eight o’clock that night—a night of complete darkness—Henley was found unconscious, lying in a little used walk in the Common. There was a bullet hole through his left shoulder, and he was bleeding profusely. He was removed to the hospital, where he regained consciousness for just a moment.

  “Who shot you?” he was asked.

  “None of your business,” he replied, and lapsed into unconsciousness.

  CHAPTER IV

  Entirely unaware of this latest attempt on the life of the broker, Hutchinson Hatch steadily pursued his investigations. They finally led him to an intimate friend of Reginault Cabell. The young Southerner had apartments on the fourth floor of the big house off Commonwealth Avenue, directly over those Henley occupied, but two flights higher up. This friend was a figure in the social set of the Back Bay. He talked to Hatch freely of Cabell.

  “He’s a good fellow,” he explained, “one of the best I ever met, and comes of one of the best families Virginia ever had—a true F.F.V. He’s pretty quick tempered and all that, but an excellent chap, and everywhere he has gone here he has made friends.”

  “He used to be in love with Miss Lipscomb of Virginia, didn’t he?” asked Hatch, casually.

  “Used to be?” the other repeated with a laugh. “He is in love with her. But recently he understood that she was engaged to Weldon Henley, a broker—you may have heard of him?—and that, I suppose, has dampened his ardor considerably. As a matter of fact, Cabell took the thing to heart. He used to know Miss Lipscomb in Virginia—she comes from another famous family there—and he seemed to think he had a prior claim on her.”

  Hatch heard all these things as any man might listen to gossip, but each additional fact was sinking into his mind, and each additional fact led his suspicions on deeper into the channel they had chosen.

  “Cabell is pretty well to do,” his informant went on, “not rich as we count riches in the North, but pretty well to do, and I believe he came to Boston because Miss Lipscomb spent so much of her time here. She is a beautiful young woman of twenty-two and extremely popular in the social world everywhere, particularly in Boston. Then there was the additional fact that Henley was here.”

  “No chance at all for Cabell?” Hatch suggested.

  “Not the slightest,” was the reply. “Yet despite the heartbreak he had, he was the first to congratulate Henley on winning her love. And he meant it, too.”

  “What’s his attitude toward Henley now?” asked Hatch. His voice was calm, but there was an underlying tense note imperceptible to the other.

  “They meet and speak and move in the same set. There’s no love lost on either side, I don’t suppose, but there is no trace of any ill feeling.”

  “Cabell doesn’t happen to be a vindictive sort of man?”

  “Vindictive?” and the other laughed. “No. He’s like a big boy, forgiving, and all that; hot-tempered, though. I could imagine him in a fit of anger making a personal matter of it with Henley, but I d
on’t think he ever did.”

  The mind of the newspaper man was rapidly focusing on one point; the rush of thoughts, questions and doubts silenced him for a moment. Then:

  “How long has Cabell been in Boston?”

  “Seven or eight months—that is, he has had apartments here for that long—but he has made several visits South. I suppose it’s South. He has a trick of dropping out of sight occasionally. I understand that he intends to go South for good very soon. If I’m not mistaken, he is trying now to rent his suite.”

  Hatch looked suddenly at his informant; an idea of seeing Cabell and having a legitimate excuse for talking to him had occurred to him.

  “I’m looking for a suite,” he volunteered at last. “I wonder if you would give me a card of introduction to him? We might get together on it.”

  Thus it happened that half an hour later, about ten minutes past nine o’clock, Hatch was on his way to the big apartment house. In the office he saw the manager.

  “Heard the news?” asked the manager.

  “No,” Hatch replied. “What is it?”

  “Somebody’s shot Mr. Henley as he was passing through the Common early tonight.

  Hatch whistled his amazement.

  “Is he dead?”

  “No, but he is unconscious. The hospital doctors say it is a nasty wound, but not necessarily dangerous.”

  “Who shot him? Do they know?”

  “He knows, but he won’t say.”

  Amazed and alarmed by this latest development, an accurate fulfillment of The Thinking Machine’s prophecy, Hatch stood thoughtful for a moment, then recovering his composure a little asked for Cabell.

  “I don’t think there’s much chance of seeing him,” said the manager. “He’s going away on the midnight train—going South, to Virginia.”

  “Going away tonight?” Hatch gasped.

  “Yes; it seems to have been rather a sudden determination. He was talking to me here half an hour or so ago, and said something about going away. While he was here the telephone boy told me that Henley had been shot; they had phoned from the hospital to inform us. Then Cabell seemed greatly agitated. He said he was going away tonight, if he could catch the midnight train, and now he’s packing.”