The Substitute Prisoner Part 20

"Where's Mr. Ward?" demanded the visitor. "Has he--" The man paused as, for the first time, he recognized Britz. "Why, lieutenant, I didn't expect to find you here," he said.

"Peck!" exclaimed Britz. "What brought you here?"

"The chief sent me. He just got word from Delmore Park that Ward has skipped."

"What!" An angry frown overspread Britz's features.

"Ward must have known that he was being trailed," pursued the visitor.

"This morning, Grady was hidden in the bushes opposite the house waiting for Ward to come out. Two men set on him, bound and gagged him and left him lying on the gra.s.s. A pa.s.ser-by found him half an hour ago and untied him. Grady telephoned immediately that Ward had made a get-away."

"And the chief sent you down here?" asked Britz.

"Yes. We had got word of the failure and the chief thought I'd better come down here to look things over."

Here was a new disappointment for Britz. The one man whom he wished to see above all others, had slipped out of his grasp.

"We've got to act quickly," said Britz, consulting his watch. "You stay right here. I'll go down to Headquarters."

CHAPTER XIII

Fortune had turned her back on Britz on two critical occasions. First, Julia Strong had eliminated herself as a factor in the investigation of the Whitmore murder. Next, Lester Ward had been permitted to disappear at the very moment when he might have been induced to shed light on the crime. Since all crimes must be proved through witnesses, the loss of two of the most important ones was a staggering blow to Britz. It did not diminish his confidence in himself nor in his belief that he would eventually find the murderer. But to prove his case in court--his future efforts would have to be attended by more luck than had been vouchsafed him hitherto, if a successful prosecution were to be achieved.

As though the adverse fates that had pursued him were content with the havoc they had wrought, Britz was greeted by a rare piece of good fortune as he entered Police Headquarters. It came in the person of Muldoon, whom Britz encountered in the corridor.

"Got a prisoner for you!" beamed Muldoon. "The gent you told me to watch for."

"Where is he?" asked the detective.

"Downstairs."

"Where'd you get him?"

"Just where you said I would. You said he'd come around to the Tombs lookin' for the boss, and sure enough he came about half an hour after you left. I remembered having seen him hanging around the place yesterday and the day before, but I wasn't sure of him so I didn't molest him. This morning he comes to the door and asks to see Mr. Beard.

Then I knew at once I had the right man. I collared him and had the nippers on him before he knew what struck him. Also, I relieved him of the bundle of papers he had and Greig is lookin' through 'em now."

"Did he say anything when you arrested him?" asked Britz, favoring his subordinate with a smile of approval.

"He cried like a woman," replied Muldoon. "Said he hadn't done anything and wanted to give me ten dollars to let him go. The papers, he kept saying, belonged to his boss and he didn't intend to steal them.

Evidently he thinks he's been arrested for stealin' the papers."

Britz found the prisoner in a state of collapse. Opening the door of the butler's cell, he dragged the s.h.i.+vering inmate into the narrow corridor and forced him against the wall. With drooping head and sagging body, the butler regarded Britz as though afraid the detective had come to execute him on the spot.

Nor did the att.i.tude which Britz adopted toward the prisoner tend to relieve his terror.

"So you thought you'd elope with the papers I went to all the trouble to gather?" snarled the detective. "You thought you could fool the police--eh!"

"No, sir! No, sir, I didn't," quavered the prisoner. "I didn't mean to fool you. I didn't know you were a detective. I know you said so, but anybody could say so and show a badge. I took the papers because I thought Mr. Beard might need them. And ever since I've been in hiding for fear I'd be arrested! To-day I made up my mind to deliver them to Mr. Beard. I was afraid to approach that awful looking jail, but finally I did so and a detective immediately arrested me. He was awfully rough,"

complained the butler. "He hurt my wrists and tore my collar. I gave the papers to him without any struggle--really, sir, if I'd met you I should have given them to you."

Britz thrust the butler back into the cell and closed the door.

"Won't you please let me go?" pleaded the prisoner, clutching frantically at the bar. "I haven't done anything."

Unheedful of the man's appeal, the detective ascended the iron stairs and hastened into his private office. He found Manning and Greig seated at his desk scrutinizing the papers.

"Anything of value in them?" asked Britz.

"Not yet," returned the chief. "But we haven't finished with them."

Britz applied himself to the doc.u.ments, his eyes racing through them in futile search of something that might shed a welcome illumination on the dark complexities of the case. But the papers contained nothing of worth to the police. Mostly they related to Whitmore's business affairs, which apparently were in a healthy and flouris.h.i.+ng condition.

With a shrug of disappointment the detective flung the last of the doc.u.ments from him.

"Wasted labor!" he observed to the chief. "Might as well return them to Beard."

"Here is one we haven't examined," said Manning, offering a long, white envelope to Britz. "I don't know whether we are justified in opening it."

The back of the envelope had been sealed with wax in three places, and the seals were still undisturbed. Across the front of it was written,--

"Last will and testament of Herbert Whitmore."

Britz regarded the envelope with covetous eyes.

"There is no law which prevents the police from examining a murdered man's will," he remarked. "I suppose the proper thing would be to open it in the presence of the attorney for the deceased. But we are all disinterested witnesses so far as the doc.u.ment is concerned, so we'll proceed to examine it."

With a penknife Britz slit open the long edge of the envelope and, without waiting for authorization from his chief, spread the doc.u.ment before him. It consisted of three sheets of legal cap, to the last page of which Whitmore's signature and the names of two witnesses were affixed.

"Two pages of minor bequests," commented Britz as he finished reading the second sheet of the will.

On the final paragraph of the third sheet, the detective's eyes lingered a long while. Half a dozen times he reread the significant clause, then pa.s.sed it to the chief. Manning perused it with widening orbs, finally handing the paper to Greig. The latter absorbed the contents at a glance and returned the paper to Britz.

"So Mrs. Collins inherits the residue--practically the entire Whitmore estate!" exclaimed Manning. "What does it mean?"

Greig bounded out of his seat as if released by a spring. He stood a moment as if to fling out a loud cry of exultation, but the serious expression on the faces of the others checked his ardor. A shade of doubt flitted across his face, but vanished instantly and was succeeded by a look which seemed to imply a sudden clearness of vision.

"Yes, by George! it's as plain as daylight!" he burst forth. "She's the one--I suspected her all the time! Now we have it--the motive and the explanation of her silence! Her brother a bankrupt, perhaps a defaulter.

A fugitive, too! Her money sunk, her husband's money lost! She knew she was the chief beneficiary of the will--don't you see what Whitmore's death meant to her? We've deluded ourselves into the belief that it was to her interest to keep Whitmore alive. What chumps we were."

Britz's glance was alternating between the excited Greig and the impa.s.sive Manning, contrasting the riotous enthusiasm of the one with the quiet deliberation of the other.

"What do you think of it, chief?" he asked.

"I think we ought to put it up to her good and strong," advised Manning.

"Threaten to lock her up if she doesn't explain."