In the Onyx Lobby Part 12

"How you going to work on the case?" asked Moore, eagerly interested.

"I'm going to get the truth out of you!" declared Corson, so suddenly and brusquely that Moore turned white.

"What!" he cried.

"Yes, just that. You know a lot about the matter that you haven't told,--so you can just out with it!"

"Me? I don't know anything."

"Now, now, the thing is too thin. How could Binney get in here, and then his murderer come in and have the whole shooting-match pulled off in the short time it would take you to run Vail up to the tenth floor and drop your car down again?"

"But--but, you see, I--I stood quite a while talking to Mr Vail after we stopped at his floor."

"What'd you do that for?"

"Why, we were talking about the book I was reading----"

"You were both talking--or you were talking to him?"

"I guess that's it. I was so crazy about the book I'd talk to anybody who'd listen, and Mr Vail was real good-natured, and I guess I let myself go----"

"And babbled on, till he was bored to death and sent you away."

"Just about that," and Moore grinned, sheepishly. "I'm terribly fond of detective stories."

"Yes, so you've said. Well, your book is called, I believe, 'Murder Will Out,' so, as that's pretty true, you might as well own up first as last."

"Own up to what?"

"That you killed Sir Binney! Where's the knife? What did you do it for?

Don't you know you'll be arrested, tried, convicted and sentenced?

Yes--sentenced!"

Corson's habit of flinging out rapid-fire questions took on new terror from the fierce frown with which he accompanied his speech, and Bob Moore's knees trembled beneath him.

"W--what are you talking about? I--I didn't k--kill him!"

"Yes, you did! You got all wrought up over those fool story books of yours and you went bug, and killed him in a frenzy of imagination!"

"Oh, oh! I didn't--I,----"

"Then explain your movements! You came down from your talk with Vail, full of murder thoughts. You saw Binney come in, and, moved by the opportunity and obsessed with the murder game, you let drive and killed him, in a sort of mania!"

"Oh, no! no!" and Moore fell limply into a seat and began to sob wildly.

"Stop that!" Corson ordered. "I've got to find out about this. I believe you did it,--I believe I've struck the truth, for the simple reason that there's no other suspect. This man Binney had no enemies. Why, he's a peaceable Englishman, in trade,--and a big trade. I know all about him.

He wanted to place his Bun business over here. He'd confabbed with several Bakery men in this city, and was about to make a deal. He was on good terms with his people here,--sort of relatives, they are,--and he was a gay old boy in his social tastes. Now, who's going to stick up a man like that? There was no robbery,--his watch and kale were all right there. So there's no way to look, but toward you! _You!_" A pointed forefinger emphasized Corson's words and Moore broke into fresh sobs.

"I tell you I didn't! Why, it's too absurd--too----"

"Not absurd at all. I know something of psychology, and I know how those murder yarns, read late at nights,--when you're here alone, get into your blood, and--well, it's a wonder you didn't stick Vail! But I suppose his indulgent listening to your ravings helped along your murder instinct, and you----"

"Oh, hus.h.!.+ If you keep on you'll make me think I did do it!"

"Of course,--you can't think anything else. Now, here's another thing.

You say you went up for Dr Pagett at twenty past two."

"Or a few minutes later."

"Well, Pagett said,--I asked him privately,--that it was at least quarter to three! What were you doing all that time?"

"It wasn't--I didn't--oh, Mr Corson, I told you the truth. I waited to catch the last words of----"

"Yes, of your own victim! And then, frightened, you hung around twenty minutes or so before calling the doctor."

"I did not! But," and Moore pulled himself together, "I'm not going to say another word! You've doped out this c.o.c.k-and-bull story because you don't know which way to look for the real murderer. And you think you can work a third degree on me--and railroad me to the chair, do you?

Well, you can't do it!"

Moore's eyes were glittering, his cheeks were flushed and his voice rose to a shrill shriek as he glared wildly at his tormentor.

"Shut up on that!" Corson flung at him. "Calm yourself down, now. If you're innocent, it's all right. But I'll keep my eye on you, my boy.

Now, tell me any theory you have or can invent that will fit the facts of the case."

Corson asked this in the honest hope that Moore could give him a hint.

The detective was a good plodding sleuth when it came to tracking down a clew, but he was not fertile of imagination and had little or no initiative. He really believed it might have been Moore's work, but he thought so, princ.i.p.ally, because he could think of no other way to look.

"The facts are not so very strange," began Moore, looking at the detective uncertainly. He didn't want to give any unnecessary help, for he had a half-formed theory that he wanted to think out for himself, and he had no intention of sharing it with an avowed enemy. But he saw, too, that a few words of suggestion of any sort might lead Corson's suspicions away from himself and might make for leniency.

"Wait a minute," he said, on a sudden thought. "The writing the dying man managed to scribble said that women did the murder."

"That's my best bet!" cried Corson; "I've been waiting for you to mention that! You wrote that paper! That's what occupied you all that time. Of course women didn't do a deed like that. You conceived the fiendishly clever idea of writing such a message to mislead the police!"

"You--you----" but words failed Bob Moore. He reverted to his plan of silence and sat, moodily staring in front of him, as the dawn broke and the time drew near for the day s.h.i.+ft of workers to come on.

"Don't you think so?" and Corson now spoke almost ingratiatingly. "I mean don't you think it pretty impossible for women to put over such a crime?"

"No, I don't," Bob blurted out. "Nor you wouldn't either, if you knew Binney! Why, his life just one--h'm--one woman after another! And they were all after him!"

"What do you mean?"

"Why he was a regular feller, you know. He took the chorus girls,--or some of their sort,--out to dinners and all that, and, here in the house, he jollied the elevator girls and the telephone and news-stand Janes,--and yet he detested girls' service. Many a time he'd blow out to the manager about how he'd ought to fire all the girls and put back men or boys,--like we had before the war."

"Your story doesn't hang together. Binney seemed to adore and hate the girls, both."

"That's just it, he did. He'd storm and rail at Daisy,--she's on his elevator, and then he'd turn around and chuck her under the chin, and like as not bring her home a big box of chocolates."

"Oh, well, I've heard of men like that before."