The Perfume of Eros: A Fifth Avenue Incident Part 23

This opinion, editorial and offhand though it was, was immediately and officially indorsed. For the story had a double merit. It supplied not merely a clue but a case. A very clear case, too. There was the antecedent threat, the opportunity, the instrument, everything even to the motive which was reasonable enough. The inevitable ensued.

Annandale, arrested, was held without bail.

At the news of that Sylvia shuddered. Time touched her. Her eyes ringed themselves with sudden circles. The shuddering pa.s.sed, but the rings remained. She became whiter, harder, more resolute, divining dimly that somewhere, somehow, there was a duty to be performed. What the duty was to be the press disclosed. Against Annandale was public opinion. There he was convicted instanter. At the injustice, or what seemed to her the injustice, of that she revolted.

But Orr, whom Annandale had immediately retained, dosed her with a plat.i.tude. "Public opinion be hanged," he said. "What is it but the stupidity of one multiplied by the stupidity of all. _Vox populi, vox stulti._ The majority is always c.o.c.ksure and dead wrong."

In spite, though, of general stupidity there were people sufficiently indulgent to accord Annandale the benefit of extenuating circ.u.mstances. The reputation of Loftus, which left rather a little to be desired; the coupling of his name with that of Annandale's wife; the report that for his sake the latter had been preparing to leave her husband; the further report that for the convenience of both Marie Leroy had been s.h.i.+pped abroad; these things reduced the case in the minds of the indulgent to what the French call a _crime pa.s.sionnel_, and which, as such, is psychologically and even legally defensible.

But French views are not our views. Besides, admitting their validity, that validity was impaired by the att.i.tude which Annandale a.s.sumed. He omitted to admit, and thereby for the time being waived the right to plead, the circ.u.mstances advanced in his justification. When charged had he said, "Oh, yes, I did it, and so would you or any other man,"

there, don't you see, might have been an excuse. But not a bit of it.

Up and down he denied that he was the culprit.

A denial such as that has, though, its merits. It puts on the prosecution the burden of proof. Moreover, if you have done anything you should not have it is only common sense to say that you have not done it, to say it in spite of facts, in spite of evidence, in spite of everything and everybody. For if you own up, there you are, while if you don't then no matter what is advanced you may succeed in raising a doubt and in planting it among the jury. But in this case the denial was more serviceable than ordinarily it might have been for the reason that thus far no one had been produced who could say they had been about while Annandale was at it.

These points Orr set before Sylvia. The sophistry of them displeased her. She did not like it, and said so.

"It will get him off, though," Orr confidently replied. "Unless," he hastened to add, "a witness to the act itself should pop up. Then, barring a miracle, he is a goner. But otherwise I will get him off. It may take a year or two, but I'll do it."

"I don't want you to get him off," Sylvia scornfully retorted. "I want him vindicated."

"You see, though," Orr with unruffleable calm continued, "if a witness should pop up, a witness, let us say, whom I cannot discredit, vindication will be difficult. It will be difficult to make twelve imbeciles in a pen believe that when Annandale shot Loftus----"

"He never shot him," Sylvia cried.

"My dear cousin," Orr with the same unruffleable calm pursued, "the beauty of your faith is wonderful. You must come to court and inject it among the jury. Faith that used to move mountains may yet move men.

But I doubt it. I doubt that it could make them credit the incredible, the fact patent to me as it should be to you, that though Annandale shot Loftus he was, and for that matter still is, totally unconscious of it."

"He never shot him."

"My dear Sylvia, forgive me. He did. Though what I can say for him and, if needful, I shall say, is that he did not mean to. The intent is the essence of crime. There was no intent here. Of his own free will the man would not hurt a fly. But that night he was not a free agent. He was not even a conscious agent. Of all the cells of his brain but one was awake. In that cell was an incitement inciting him to kill. When the other cells awoke that one cell fell asleep. It has been dormant since then. Only through hypnosis could it awaken. In the interim he knew no more than a somnambulist what he was about. His condition, though, was not somnambulistic, it was a case of psychical epilepsy, a malady superinducible in certain natures by various poisons, of which anger is one and alcohol another."

Orr paused. He looked at his cousin. Incredulity, something else besides, was in her face. He affected not to notice it. "Now," he ran on, "go with a story like that to the average jury. Of course, if need be, I shall have experts, the very best experts, to substantiate it.

But the prosecution will have other experts, experts who will be just as good, to deny the possibility of any such thing. In that event it will be only a pleasure to mix them up a bit and to show by their own testimony that they know no more than the law--I don't say allows but--pays them for. Do you mind if I smoke?"

They were seated in the sombre parlor in Irving Place. Meditatively Orr lit a cigarette. Meditatively Sylvia contemplated him.

"Would it not be better," she presently asked, "to show that Loftus committed suicide?"

"Yes, in the event that the pistol is found. It is rather late, though, for that."

Sylvia bent forward. "Melanchthon," she said, "I have heard you say--have I not--that everything is possible?"

"Indeed you have and you will hear me again."

"Then why not ask Miranda?"

Orr looked about for a _cendrier_; finding one he put his cigarette in it. "You mean the medium. Do you know, I would in a minute, were it not that it will be a long time, perhaps years, before she or any other spook could call Loftus up. When a man is snuffed out as abruptly as he was, he is so stunned and confused that it is quite a while before he can sufficiently collect his wits to reply to any communications from these lat.i.tudes. It is tedious that it should be so. The spirit world needs remodeling. But there you are. By the way, where are you to be this summer?"

Sylvia made a gesture. She did not know. It was then June. Fas.h.i.+on had fled. Fifth avenue was empty. The town was an oven. In that oven the girl would have preferred to remain. But at the preference her mother had rebelled. Against Newport Sylvia had rebelled also. She was in no mood for its gaiety. Finally a little place on Long Island suggested itself. Ultimately there they went.

It was in this place that Sylvia heard from Mrs. Price of f.a.n.n.y's illness. f.a.n.n.y had disappointed her exceedingly. That she could have so much as contemplated the step which she had in view seemed to Sylvia unspeakable. Her threat, too, in regard to testifying against her husband was in the circ.u.mstances but a flagrant avowal of love for the other man. Yet, for that love, how had she been punished! Perhaps now she repented of it. Perhaps now in her illness she needed someone to whom she could unburden her heart. At the thought of that Sylvia wrote at once to Mrs. Price asking might she not come to her. But to this Mrs. Price replied that f.a.n.n.y after an attack of nervous prostration was now down with typhoid, though with every prospect and a.s.surance of recovery. When she was up again, then, if Sylvia would come, it would, Mrs. Price added, be nice of her.

There is a saying trite yet true that we should hasten to cherish those whom we love lest they leave us forever before we have loved them enough. There is another saying less true and more trite that of those that do leave only good should be said. To Sylvia presently these sayings recurred. Two days after the receipt of the letter from Mrs. Price she read in the papers that f.a.n.n.y was dead.

The paper fell from her. For an hour, which pa.s.sed as only such hours do pa.s.s, incomprehensibly, without consciousness of time, she sat, still and stricken.

Through raveled skeins of thought of which the tangled threads refused to wholly straighten, she blamed herself for all that had occurred.

Not indeed for Loftus. The man, his life, his death, everything concerning him was abhorrent to her. Of him, other than that pity which can mingle with disgust, she had no concern whatever. But when she should have stood most steadfastly by Annandale she had turned from him. Had he not implored her forgiveness, and did she not know that all that G.o.d requires is that forgiveness be asked? But no. She had been too proud and that pride she had nursed until it was too late, until Annandale had married, with this double tragedy for climax.

It was all her fault, Sylvia told herself. All her own. Had she not abandoned Annandale he would have had no cause to threaten, f.a.n.n.y would have lived, there would have been no shock to debilitate her and leave her a prey to disease. f.a.n.n.y's death was at her door.

Companioned by these thoughts for an hour she sat, still and stricken.

When she aroused herself it seemed as though before her two figures stood. One said "I am Duty," the other, "I am Grief."

A message from the latter she imparted to Mrs. Price. Many messages not similar but cognate that lady received. f.a.n.n.y had been very popular. Her popularity the rumor connecting her with Loftus had necessarily impaired. The arrest of her husband for shooting the man, and for shooting him, as it was generally understood, on her account, impaired it still more. In the upper circles the scandalous may be relished, but it is not indorsed. Had f.a.n.n.y lived, those circles would have visited their displeasure in not visiting her at all. But death is a peacemaker. It comes and where there was war is a truce. By the worldly f.a.n.n.y was immediately forgiven and by them as quickly forgot.

It was in July that she died. In September Sylvia returned to town. At once she asked Orr to arrange for her a visit to Annandale in the Tombs.

To that he objected. "You know," he said, "that you will have to testify against him."

"Against him!" Sylvia repeated with an air of utter surprise.

"Why, yes. He was here that night. He has admitted it. You will be asked to tell what he said."

In Sylvia's eyes both disdain and acquiescence surged. "And what of it?"

"But," Orr exclaimed, "there is the threat. He made it in the presence of Harris and repeated it in yours."

"He did nothing of the kind."

"But you told me so."

"You are mistaken. I know nothing of any threat whatever."

"Oh," said Orr with a bow, "this is magnificent."

But he meant heroic. In view of the girl's nature it was certainly that. What is more, it was helpful. With f.a.n.n.y out of the way, the only one left that could testify to any threat was Harris, and Annandale's word was quite as good as his, better even, for the value of the servant's testimony would be weighed in scales in one of which would be the _Chronicle's_ dollars.

Orr said as much to Sylvia, but apparently his views did not seem to her very novel. It became obvious to him that she had thought it all out for herself.

"Besides," she presently and irrelevantly continued, "I am to blame.

If I had not been stupid with him, there would have been nothing to threaten about."

That, Orr thought, was rather putting the dots on the i's. But he did not mind. He was pleased with her. His respect for her had increased.

Had she been the kind of a cousin to permit such a thing there and then he would have kissed her.

Yet some reward he felt was her due. As a result the interview which she asked he presently arranged. Under conditions which to her were as tragic as they were humiliating she saw Annandale in the visitors'

room at the Tombs. The room itself was not absolutely appalling, and though there was a keeper present, he was quite out of earshot, very oblivious, extremely civil and, parenthetically, handsomely paid.