The Gray Mask by Charles Wadsworth Camp (children's ebooks online .txt) 📕

He managed to turn, but the other had protected himself against the cold by rolling his collar up about his face and drawing his slouch hat down to meet it.

"Slower!" Randall commanded.

The car swerved. The other cried hoarsely:

"Look out! Hold tight!"

Randall clung, but the car kept the road. Its speed was all at once reduced. With a disconcerting jerk it came to a standstill. As Randall, trying to recover his balance, started to speak angrily, something soft and blinding struck his face and enveloped his head. His hands, raised purposelessly, were caught and pinioned. The cloth suddenly became moist and a familiar odor arose. The other laughed as he fastened a cord about the arms and body. Randall gasped. His bound limbs relaxed.

The driver turned the car, and, with one arm around the senseless doctor, drove in leisurely fashion back towards Elmford.

Hidden among the undergrowth at some distance from the house stood a small, partly ruined stone building, used once, from the water flowing nearby, as a spring house. The driver carried Randall to the interior of this building and placed him on the floor. Lighting a match, he glanced around.

The unfinished walls were mottled with the melancholy vegetation which takes hold in places where the sun is forbidden. Drops of water oozed from the stones. The earth yielded to the pressure of feet soggily.

The man raised his hat higher on his forehead and lowered his coat collar, exposing a face that was handsome in a weak and flippant way. He grinned rather foolishly now at his victim, outstretched on the damp floor. He swayed a trifle, steadied himself with an effort, then, as the glow of the match expired, bent over and thrust his hand in Randall's pocket.

He drew out a key ring. He struck another match and ran quickly over the ring until he had found the key he desired. This he slipped from the ring into his own pocket and returned the rest to Randall's coat.

On the point of leaving, he hesitated, and with a resolute air stooped and removed the cloth from Randall's head and the cord from the body. Afterwards he took a small bottle from his pocket, forced the unconscious man's lips open and poured a quantity of the fluid down his throat. Evidently the doctor would sleep thoroughly and for a long time.

When he had gathered up the cloth, the rope, and the bottle, the man left the stone building, laughing with a satisfaction that was not wholly vicious. In spite of the anger his face had displayed the situation for him possessed at least a tiny element of humour.

He secreted the compromising bundle beneath a large stone in the bed of the stream.

"Put it over," he muttered. "People'll say the old boy was off his head or's a reason why we had to have prohibition."

His lurch was more pronounced as he walked to the car, and his manner less confident as he drove on to the house.

He alighted and, steadying himself against the mud-guard, gazed at the dark, forbidding façade in which that diffused and indeterminate radiance alone suggested habitation.

After a time he straightened, climbed the steps, and crossed the verandah. He felt in his pocket for the latch-key he had taken from Randall, inserted it in the lock, and noiselessly opened the door. He was very careful to see that the door did not latch behind him. He placed the key on the hall table. He folded his coat and laid it with his cap on a chair. Stealthily he advanced along the dark and silent hall to the stairway.

At the sound of his automobile Bella had half arisen. She waited attentively, but when for some time no sound followed, she walked to the window, raised it, and leaned out, striving unsuccessfully to penetrate the heavy night.

A board creaked in the corridor outside her door.

She swung around, her hand at her throat.

"John!"

Complete silence followed. Unless something out of all reckoning had occurred, her husband could not be back. None of the servants would have used an automobile. Then who prowled about the unlighted house and hesitated in the vicinity of her door?

"John!"

The formlessness of her cry unveiled her fear.

The knob moved. Inch by inch the door opened, and, inch by inch, as if impelled by a perfectly controlled impulse from the door widening on the intruder, she retreated until the wall held her.

"Freddy!" she gasped.

He stepped in and closed the door. It could scarcely have been apparent to her all at once how much he had been drinking, for, although his face was flushed, the event justified that, and he had evidently forced on himself for the moment a supreme control. Yet her relief was short-lived. To be sure she could leave the wall and advance to meet him, yet, as if the room possessed a phonographic quality, it was still loud with her husband's anxiety and her own contemptuous promises.

"What are you doing here? How did you get in? Go before—This is out of the question."

His hand left the knob.

"It's all right, Bella. Needn't be afraid. Randall's out of the way. He won't bother us to-night."

"Then you know about Mrs. Hanson?" she asked.

He nodded sagely.

"I know a lot."

"You can't stay here," she said. "Go."

He stretched out his hands.

"Then you shall come with me. That's the scheme. Been in the back of my head all along. We'll show a clean pair of heels. Time something definite happened. Bella!—you know—how I love you."

A slight impediment, unfamiliar to the startled woman, made itself noticeable in his voice. His control was limited. Already his true condition disclosed itself. Fear as powerful as that which had greeted his stealthy approach returned to her eyes.

"You know I won't come with you, Freddy. Perhaps later things will be arranged. John and I had a talk to-night."

His face worked evilly.

"He had a talk with me, too," he said. "It's come to a showdown. No use talking about waiting, Bella. It's now or never. You've held me off too long. Got to choose. We love each other."

He advanced. She stepped behind the table.

"Don't come any nearer, Freddy. What's the matter with you?"

He laughed.

"Just you."

He tapped the side pocket of his coat.

"By gad! I'd have killed him to-night to get to you if it had been necessary. That's what you've done to me, Bella."

He reached across and grasped her arm. He held her tight while he glided around the table. A book fell to the floor, and another. A vase of roses toppled over and shattered musically. The flowers made brilliant patches on the dull carpet.

"Let me go. Listen, Freddy! We'll talk it over to-morrow—all three. I promised John I wouldn't see you to-night."

"Tomorrow!" he laughed. "Too late. You don't know all I've done for this—a real sportin' proposition. I tell you it's now or never, and I'm mad about you."

He got his arm around her.

"You've got to let me keep my promise."

Still laughing, he drew her closer. His flaming eyes were near. His breath was revolting on her cheeks.

She struggled, gasping for words.

"Let me go. You've been drinking. He said—"

"He said!" he cried furiously.

"What are you going to do?" she begged.

As he flung her back against the table the side pocket of his unbuttoned coat flapped against her hand.

"I'm not going to let you slip now, Bella."

"Freddy! You're killing me!"

She put her hand in his pocket and snatched out an unpolished, stubby, evil cylinder with a square grip which perfectly fitted her hand.

"Look out, Freddy! You hurt!"

He laughed again. His lips, repulsive and cruel, crushed hers. Her smothered crying was bitter.

An explosion, slightly muffled, crowded the room with sound. Another followed.

His lips, a moment ago masterful with unreasoning vitality, no longer troubled her.

"Freddy!" she sobbed. "I'm sorry—"

He crumpled at her feet.

Near the water, spilled from the vase of roses, a darker stain spread.

She screamed.

"What's the matter? Freddy! I'm sorry—Say something—Pray!"

She stumbled to her knees by the dead man. Her desolate cries fled ceaselessly through the open window.

Garth the next day did not repeat his floral indiscretion. One experience had convinced him that practice is necessary to the successful threading of such by-ways. His rose, in fact, had disclosed its limitations even before he had reached the inspector's flat. On his entrance it had not adorned his coat.

He read the brief and scarcely illuminating account of the Elmford murder in the morning papers. Irritation at his own assignment—an unimportant case up-town—let it slip through his mind without arousing any exceptional interest.

When he returned to the central office in the afternoon the doorman beckoned to him.

"Inspector's been asking after you."

Garth yawned.

"All right. Tell him I'm here, Ed."

After a moment the doorman called:

"Inspector says, walk in."

Garth went, and paused, ill-at-ease, just within the doorway.

The huge man lolled in his chair. His quiet eyes fixed Garth genially. For once he failed to fidget with his desk paraphernalia. His rumbling voice was abnormally mild.

Garth appreciated these portents. They connoted favoritism, but he traced that to the inspector's love for his daughter, because he was too modest to place in the scales his own conspicuous virtues.

"Come over here and sit down, Garth."

Garth obeyed.

"Thanks, inspector."

The inspector's eyes twinkled.

"Boys tell me you're a little sore on the jobs you've had since you smashed Slim and George and their favourites."

Garth grew red.

"There are old women everywhere," he said. "Nothing to do but talk."

The inspector guffawed.

"Ain't it so?"

"Incriminating question, chief."

The other leaned forward.

"I can't take chances with such a valuable man."

He cleared his throat.

"Were you thinking of paying your party call to-night? Because I've got to disappoint you. But I don't want to do that two ways. I can't see anything particularly dangerous about this job, but I'd like you to look it over this afternoon. It's the Elmford murder. Suppose you've read about it."

"I glanced it over in the morning papers," Garth answered. "They were short on details."

"There doesn't seem much to clear up," the inspector said, "except Dr. Randall's whereabouts. The men I sent out this morning haven't got a trace. Nothing's been heard from the ferries or the stations or out of town. Seems there ought to be some indication at the house for a sharp pair of eyes."

"There's no doubt then," Garth asked, "that he killed Treving?"

The inspector ran his hand through his hair.

"Those must have been rotten papers you read," he answered. "Ask me if Cain killed Abel. Treving's goings-on with Randall's wife have been common gossip. The boys blushed about it in the clubs up town. Listen, Garth. I've found out things you won't get from any papers. Randall and Treving met at their club last night. Seems Randall had overheard some of this conversation. I've had a few of the high-hat crowd down here to-day, and one of the hall boys who heard what went on between Randall and Treving. Randall warned Treving away with threats. Treving lost his head and offered to bet he'd spend last evening with Mrs. Randall."

"Good Lord!" Garth exclaimed. "Was he drunk?"

"Can't tell," the inspector said. "The boy thought he had been drinking, but he didn't believe he was drunk. That don't mean much. Nothing like a college education to teach a man how to carry his liquor. Anyway, Randall came back with his own conviction. Swore he'd shoot Treving if such a thing came off. Well! Randall found Treving late last night in the lady's dressing-room."

"Pretty bad," Garth agreed, "but I've never thought threats were very satisfactory evidence."

"Plenty of other evidence," the inspector answered. "Randall had stayed late in town. He must have driven up and found Treving's car by the verandah. They're both there now. Easy to understand how that sight fixed his resolution to kill. And the signs of the struggle are all over the room. He left in a hurry after he had shot him. He lost his hat off, rushing down the stairs. It's lying by the newel post. Mark my words. When we find Randall he'll have a