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Show By BEN AMES WILLIAMS Copyright WNU SERVICB CHAPTER XVI Continued 15 "Is Rab dead?" Lissa asked pleadingly. "Rab?" Miss Moss echoed. "You mean Asa?" Lissa straightened, quick hope in her eyes. '"No, no," she protested. "Rab is mine! Is he all right?" Miss Moss tried to collect her wits. "Rab is hurt, but he will get well," she said then, and she felt new life flow into this girl. "But Asa is dead." "Oh, I'm glad! I'm glad!" Lissa cried; and she demanded to know what had happened. Miss Moss told her swiftly as much as she knew; and having done so, she ventured a question in her turn. So Lissa, clinging cling-ing close to the older woman, poured out all her fetory. "Rab and I were married over a year ago," she confessed. "Father and Mother knew; but we didn't tell anyone else, because Rab's people would disown him. "I knew Asa too, and he used to make love to me. So finally, to make him stop, I told him Rab and I were married. But it didn't do any good. He kept after me just the same, and when I threatened to tell Rab, he said if I did, he'd tell old Mrs. Bowdon we were married. So I didn't tell Rab; but last night Asa kissed me, and Rab saw him, and was furious with me, so I had to tell him. Then he was wild at Asa " She broke off, for they were come suddenly to the top of Kenesaw Hill, to the Taine house. Inspector Tope hurried across the lawn. Miss Moss saw how tired he was, and held him hard for a moment. "There," she whispered, "dear man!" And she asked: "Where is Clint? Where is June?" He pointed to the Bowdon house a little way off, where there was a lighted window on the second floor. "They're asleep up there. Miss Leaford is in bed with a blanket over her; Clint in a chair beside her, holding hold-ing her hand." There was a deep exhilaration in her; then turning to Tope she said: "So it was Asa? You know, I picked Rab, all the time." Tope shook his head. "He was in Providence last night, when the fire started," he reminded her. "I thought he might have gone down there and registered, and then come back to set the fire, raced back to Providence again. There was time." "No, he'd put his car up for the night," Tope insisted. "He was there, all right." He added awkwardly: awk-wardly: "I didn't tell you, but he had a girl with him. They registered regis-tered as man and wife." She remembered, suddenly, Lissa Lis-sa Thayer, and turned back to the car. Lissa and her father were no longer long-er there; so Tope and Miss Moss went toward the house. They met Doctor Cabler with Mrs. Taine in f the hall. Doctor Cabler explained: "I'm sending Mrs. Taine to bed. She must rest." Mrs. Taine protested wearily: "Rab needs me." "He's all right," the Doctor assured as-sured her. "His wife is with him." And he and Mrs. Taine went on upstairs. "His wife?" Tope echoed incredulously. incredu-lously. "Of course Lissa. She was the one with him in Providence," she whispered. Tope and Miss Moss withdrew unnoticed. un-noticed. They went out on the front porch together, and Tope sat down. He shook his head helplessly. "Well, that's one on me," he confessed. "I guess I'm getting old. I was sure she was married to Asa." "So was I," she admitted, eager to comfort him now. "Till she told me the truth, on the way up here . . . Now tell me about tonight." And she listened while he recited the tale. "I blame myself," he declared de-clared at last, "for holding off, waiting wait-ing to be sure." And he said in a somber tone: "Asa was mad, drunk with killing. He had a ladder ready over there. He must have meant to come back tonight, climb to June's room, kill her and old Mr. llurder too." And he explained: "Mrs. Taine gave June milk tonight. 1 think Asa had drugged that; but I spilled it, like a clumsy fool." "Cabler says Rab can talk now," H;-ale told them a little later. Rab had a twisted frown between his eyes. Lissa bent over him, and Miss Moss saw his fingers tighten on her hand. "Where's Mother? I don't want her to hear." "Asleep," Doctor Cabler assured him. The hurt man nodded. "Where's Asa?" he asked then. No one answered an-swered him, but he seemed not to notice this neglect. "It was about Lissa," he repeated. "You see. she and I were married. We kept it secret, se-cret, because Asa and June and I weren't supposed to get married without permission. It was in Grandpa Bowdon's will, and Grandpa Grand-pa Hurder's too, that if any of us married without Grandma Bowdon's consent, we were outcasts, disinherited." And he said: "But Asa was making mak-ing love to Lissa whenever he caught her alone. I didn't know it, till I saw him kiss her, last night. She'd been in Providence with me. We used to go away together whenever when-ever I had business out of town." He looked up at the girl beside him with a deep fondness. "I saw him kiss her," he explained. "And she slipped away, and I found her crying, in the woods behind the barn. He'd hurt her, his hands on her arms. So she told me how he'd persecuted her for months, and I came back to do something to him." His eyes met Inspector Heale's. "And then you told me someone had killed Aunt Kitty, and set that fire, and I forgot about Asa for a i i ; I To arouse Clint and June. while. But tonight I meant to have it out with him. So on the way home, I made him stop, and we went into the garage, out of the rain. "I told him he'd got to leave Lissa alone, and he laughed at me, said if I made a row, he'd tell the folks we were married." He hesitated, continued grimly: "But I found out, last week, that Asa had been stealing trust-funds in the office. I told Grandpa Bowdon Bow-don about it, the day he died. It upset him terribly, may have killed him. But I told Asa last night that I knew about that, and that if he didn't leave Lissa alone, I'd send him to jail." He grinned ruefully. "Asa didn't say anything. I thought I'd stumped him; and I was fool enough to turn my back on him, and the next thing I knew, my light went out. This crack on the head . . . That's all I remember. What does he have to say?" Inspector Heale was about to speak, but Tope touched his arm quickly, restraining him; and Doctor Doc-tor Cabler said gravely: "You've talked enough, Rab. Get some rest now." He cleared the others briskly out of the room. Tope and Heale moved on through the hall to the front veranda; and as they emerged there, Tope said briskly: "I've had my eye on Asa ever since he produced that bottle. What I reason had he to go looking for it in the cellar, in the laundry-chute? The answer is, there wasn't any reason, rea-son, unless he had some other business busi-ness in the cellar." "You think he did find the bottle there?" Heale asked. Tope said explicitly: "Yes. Justus Jus-tus Taine dropped it down the chute. He left the Hurder front door unbolted un-bolted that night, slipped back over there to get some of Mrs. Leaford's sleeping-tablets. There were only two in the bottle, so he took them, and dropped the bottle out of sight in the handiest place. With so few tablets in the bottle, she'd miss them in the morning; but if the whole bottle was gone, she'd just think it was mislaid." He added honestly: "Part of this is guessing; part I know." And he went on: "So here's what we've got: Asa Taine was a thief; and he needed money. You heard what Rab said, that if any of the young ones married, they were to be disinherited. Well, Rab was married and Asa knew it; and Asa bought June new clothes, encouraged en-couraged her to marry Clint. If she did, with the old gentleman dead, and Kitty Leaford dead, and June married or dead and Rab married and so disqualified under the will, Asa'd have al) Bowdon's money, and Hurder's too." Heale listened grimly, and Tope went on: "There are three elements in every ev-ery murder," he said: "Motive, and opportunity, and capacity. "Money was motive enough for Asa. As for opportunity, he had plenty of chances to steal some of Kitty Leaford's pills, and he had a chance to drop some of them into her milk that night, when h went to the kitchen for a glass of water. "And he had a chance to dope the milk the Hurders drank, too. He came for a cup of tea, in the kitchen, kitch-en, that night got himself some milk out of the bottle, could have drugged the milk then. "I don't know whether he did that or not. It doesn't matter. But I know he started the fire. He was alone on the ground floor of the Bowdon house, his mother and Mrs. Bowdon upstairs. He slipped out and came over here. There's an electric light above the Taines' back door. You'll find the bulb is broken and the edge of the socket is fused. Asa made a short-circuit there, and then he raced back and got into the Bowdon dining-room again before Mrs. Taine came downstairs. "And he proved tonight that he was insanely ready to kilL that he had murder in him. He tried to kill Rab, and he'd made his plans to kill June and Mr. Hurder too. Asa convicted himself tonight." He added sternly: "And executed himself him-self too. Saved you the trouble, Heale." Heale stood silent awhile; the day brightened, and the sun began to burn away the clouds. The man said at last: "You know, I kind of hate this. I'm sorry for these folks up here. Four of them dead, in less than a month. They've had about enough, it looks to me." Tope smiled faintly. "Yes," he agreed; and he said gravely: "Outside "Out-side of a few people who won't talk, this thing tonight might pass as an accident, Inspector. Cars have smashed into trees before." As Heale considered this, Tope added: "You've never charged Mr. Leaford, have you? Nothing in the newspapers?" "No, just held him," Heale replied. re-plied. "He was wining to stand for that, wait till something happened." Tope nodded; and then he looked toward the road and chuckled. A car had stopped in front of the house; young Doctor Derrie swung to the ground and came briskly toward to-ward them across the lawn. The Medical Examiner greeted them cheerfully. "What's wrong, Heale?" he asked. "More trouble up here?" Heale hesitated. "Why, they had a smash-up car piled into a tree," he explained. "Asa Taine's dead, and Rab got a crack in the head." Derrie nodded. "Bad," he said gravely. Then he looked at Tope and grinned. "I suppose you're trying try-ing to make a murder out of this too," he suggested in amused derision. de-rision. But Tope shook his head. "Why, no, Doc," he said mildly. No, it was an accident, I guess. Matter of fact," he added, "I've come around to your way of thinking on Mrs. . Leaford too. Guess you were right. Guess it was an accident, just the way you said." The young doctor chuckled. "Sure," he agreed triumphantly. "I told you so. You've been seeing goblins in the dark, old man." He said: "Well, I'D go in and take a look at them." He turned into the house, and Inspector Heale looked at Tope. "What do you aim to do now?" Heale asked; and Tope hesitated, but Miss Moss said cheerfully: "Why, I think we'll wake Clint and June, and go down and get her father out of your jail, and go home." Heale chuckled. "I'll telephone down, fix that for you about Mr. Leaford," he agreed. He went into the house to do so. Tope stood still, suddenly tired. But Miss Moss hugged tight to his arm, and she smiled proudly up at him, and her eyes were shining. "You know, my dear," she said, ' "you're a grand man!" He grinned uncomfortably, wiped his mouth with his hand; and she rose on tiptoe to kiss him. Then they went together across the lawn to rouse Clint and June. THE END |