The Four-Pools Mystery Part 22

"Yes."

"I see," said Terry glancing over the printed report of the inquest, "that the coroner asked at this point if Radnor were in the habit of forgetting young ladies' coats. That's more pertinent than many of the questions he asked. How about it? Was he in the habit of forgetting young ladies' coats?"

"I really don't know, Terry," I said somewhat testily.

"It's a pity you're not more observing," he returned, "for it's important, on the whole. But never mind. I'll find that out for myself.

Did you notice when he left the rest of the party?"

"No, there was such a crowd of us that I didn't miss him."

"Very well, we'll have a look at his testimony. He left the rest of you in this same gallery of the broken column, went straight out, strolled about the woods for half an hour or so and then returned to the hotel. I fancy 'strolled' is not precisely the right word, but at any rate it's the word he uses. Now that half hour in the woods is an unfortunate circ.u.mstance. Had he gone directly to the hotel from the cave, we could have proved an alibi without any difficulty. As it is, he had plenty of time after the others came out to remember that he had forgotten the coat, return for it, renew the quarrel with his father, and after the fatal result make his way to the hotel while the rest of the party were still loitering in the woods."

"Terry--" I began.

He waved his hand in a gesture of dissent.

"Oh, I'm not saying that's what _did_ happen. I'm just showing you that the district attorney's theory is a physical possibility. Let's glance at the landlord's testimony a moment. When Radnor returned for his horse he appeared angry, excited and in a hurry. Those are the landlord's words, and they are corroborated by the stable boy and several loungers about the hotel.

"He was in a hurry--why? Because he wished to get away before the others came back. He had suddenly decided while he was in the woods--probably when he heard them laughing and talking as they came out of the cave--that he did not wish to see anyone. He was angry--mark that. All of the witnesses agree there, and I think that his actions carry out their evidence. He drank two gla.s.ses of brandy--by the way, I understood you to say he had stopped drinking. He ordered the stable boy about sharply. He swore at him for being slow. He lashed his horse quite unnecessarily as he galloped off. He rode home at an outrageous rate.

And he was not, Solomon gives me to understand, in the habit of maltreating horses.

"Now what do you make of all this? Here is a young man with an unexpended lot of temper on his hands--bent on being reckless; bent on being just as bad as he can be. It's as clear as daylight. That boy never committed any crime. A man who had just murdered his father would not be filled with anger, no matter what the provocation had been. He might be overcome with horror, fear, remorse--a dozen different emotions, but anger would not be among them. And further, a man who had committed a crime and intended to deny it later, would not proclaim his feelings in quite that blatant manner. Young g.a.y.l.o.r.d had not injured anyone; he himself had been injured. He was mad through and through, and he didn't care who knew it. He expended--you will remember--the most of his belligerency on his horse on the way home, and you found him in the summer house undergoing the natural reaction. By evening he had got himself well in hand again and was probably considerably ashamed of his conduct. He doesn't care to talk about the matter for several reasons.

Fortunately Solomon is not so scrupulous."

"I don't know what you're driving at, Terry," said I.

"Don't you?" he inquired. "Well, really, it's about time that I came down!" He paused while he scrawled one or two sentences on his copy pad, then he glanced up with a laugh. "I don't know myself, but I think I can make a pretty good guess. We'll call on Miss Polly Mathers in the morning and see if she can't help us out."

"Terry," I expostulated, "that girl knows no more about the matter than I do. She has already given her testimony, and I positively will not have her name mentioned in connection with the affair."

"I don't see how you can help it," was his cool reply. "If she's in, she's in, and I'm not to blame. However, we won't quarrel about it now; we'll pay her a call in the morning." He ran his eyes over the clippings again, then added, "There are just two more points connecting Radnor g.a.y.l.o.r.d with the murder that need explaining: the foot-prints in the cave and the match box. The foot-prints I will dismiss for the present because I have not seen them myself and I can't make any deductions from hearsay evidence. But the question of the match box may repay a little investigation. I want you to tell me precisely what happened in the woods before you went into the cave. In the first place, how many older people were there in the party?"

"Mr. and Mrs. Mathers, a lady who was visiting them and Colonel g.a.y.l.o.r.d."

"There were two servants, I understand, besides this Mose, to help about the lunch. What did they do?"

"Well, I don't know exactly. I wasn't paying much attention. I believe they carried things over from the hotel, collected wood for the fire, and then went to a farm house for water."

"But Mrs. Mathers, it seems, attended to lighting the fire?"

"Yes, she and the Colonel made the fire and started the coffee."

"Ah!" said Terry with a note of satisfaction in his voice. "The matter begins to clear. Was Colonel g.a.y.l.o.r.d in the habit of smoking?"

"He smoked one cigar after every meal."

"Never any more than that?"

"No, the doctor had limited him. The Colonel grumbled about it regularly, and always smoked the biggest blackest cigar he could find."

"And where did he get his matches?"

"Solomon pa.s.sed the bra.s.s match box from the dining-room mantelpiece just as he pa.s.sed it to us to-night."

"Colonel g.a.y.l.o.r.d was not in the habit of carrying matches in his pockets then?"

"No, I think not."

"We may safely a.s.sume," said Terry, "that in this matter of making the fire, if the two were working together, the Colonel was on his knees arranging the sticks while Mrs. Mathers was standing by, giving directions. That, I believe, is the usual division of labor. Well, then, they get to the point of needing a light. The Colonel feels through his pockets, finds that he hasn't a match and--what happens?"

"What did happen," I broke in, "was that Mrs. Mathers turned to a group of us who were standing talking at one side, and asked if any of us had a match, and Rad handed her his box. That is the last anyone remembers about it."

"Exactly!" said Terry. "And I think I can tell you the rest. You can see for yourself what took place. Mrs. Mathers went back to the spot where they were building the fire, and the Colonel took the match box from her. No man is ever going to stand by and watch a woman strike a match--he can do it so much better himself. At this point, Mrs.

Mathers--by her own testimony--was called away, and she doesn't remember anything further about the box. She thinks that she returned it. Why? For no reason on earth except that she usually returns things.

As a matter of fact, however, she didn't do it this time. She was called away and the Colonel was left to light the fire alone. He recognized the box as his son's and he dropped it into his pocket. At another time perhaps he would have walked over and handed it back; but not then. The two were not speaking to each other. Later, at the time of the struggle in the cave, the box fell from the old man's pocket, and formed a most damaging piece of circ.u.mstantial evidence against his son.

"On the whole," Terry finished, "I do not think we shall have a very difficult time in clearing Radnor. I had arrived at my own conclusions concerning him from reading the papers; what extra data I needed, I managed to glean from Solomon's lies. And as for you," he added, gazing across at me with an imperturbable grin, "I think you were wise in deciding to be a corporation lawyer."

CHAPTER XVIII

TERRY ARRIVES AT A CONCLUSION

"And now," said Terry, lighting a fresh cigar, and after a few preliminary puffs, settling down to work again, "we will consider the case of Cat-Eye Mose--a beautiful name, by the way, and apparently a beautiful character. It won't be my fault if we don't make a beautiful story out of him. You, yourself, I believe, hold the opinion that he committed the murder?"

"I am sure of it," I cried.

"In that case," laughed Terry, "I should be inclined to think him innocent."

I shrugged my shoulders. There was nothing to be gained by getting angry. If Terry chose to regard the solving of a murder mystery in the light of a joke, I had nothing to say; though I did think he might have realized that to me, at least, it was a serious matter.

"And you base your suspicions, do you not, upon the fact that he has queer eyes?"

"Not entirely."

"Upon what then?"

"Upon the fact that he took part in the struggle which ended in my uncle's death."

"Well, certainly, that does seem rather conclusive--there is no mistake about the foot-prints?"

"None whatever; the Mathers n.i.g.g.e.rs both wore shoes, and anyway they didn't go into the cave."

"In that case I suppose it's fair to a.s.sume that Mose took part in the struggle. Whether he was the only man or whether there was still a third, the cave itself ought to tell a pretty clear story."

Terry rose and paced up and down the room once or twice, and then came back and picked up one of the newspaper clippings.