OCR Text |
Show Synthetic Gentleman L channing nri POLLOCK- copyright, Channing pollock. WNU service CHAPTER XII Continued 16 - "Did It matter so much to you?" And then was sorry lie'd said It. "We've all been long on eavesdropping," eaves-dropping," he added, quickly. "Old Bidder, your father " "We've all had good reason." She was standing beside the long table. "You asked If It mattered to me,'' she said. "Don't you know?" "Why should it matter?" "Don't you know that?" "We've been good pals " he began. be-gan. She was staring at him fixedly. "Don't talk nonsense," she commanded. com-manded. Barry sat next to her. "Listen," he said. "You're a lady " She laid her hand on his arm. "I've only one question to ask," she declared, "and I count on your answering that honestly." "JTou can." "You said to Ridder 1 stayed, at first, because I was nuts about a girl.'" "Yes." "Was that true?" "Yes." "Who was she?" "I told you a month ago." "Under considerable stress. And you never repeated It Are you still nuts about her?" She used the absurd colloquialism colloquial-ism as gravely as. though It were Shakespearian English. An Invisible hand clutched at Barry's throat There was a lump there something some-thing that had to be swallowed Immediately, Im-mediately, lie felt an hysterical desire to laugh, or to cry. Then, "We won't talk about that now," he said, calmly. "Why not?" He couldn't answer. "Was that pretense, too?" Suddenly, he couldn't bear It. "You know damned well It wasn't," he burst forth, Inexcusably. "You know exactly how I feel. You've always known. Everybody's always known everything about me, It seems. I'm as much a failure fail-ure at faking as I am at everything every-thing else. ' What's the sense of discussing It now?" "This may be our last chance to discuss It." They were both standing. Looking Look-ing straight at each other. Then, rat said, "I love you." "For God's sake listen I'm the son of a ne'er-do-well." "I love you." "I'm a bum nnd a vagabond." "I love you." "Before night, I'll be a Jail bird." "I love you." "Pat" "I'll wait for you,"' Pat said. "And then we'll both start fresh." She was smiling now. "Will you marry me, Mr. Gilbert?" Gil-bert?" For answer, he caught her up In his arms. He was still holding her when the old man came through the door. "Will you step In here, please?" the old man nsked, as unemotionally unemotion-ally as though he had seen people embracing one another In this board room every day of his life. Without replying, Barry released Pat, Then he pressed her shoulder, reassuringly, re-assuringly, nnd followed Ridder. At the big desk, Mrs. Ridder wns standing. He recognized her at once, though she wns younger and prettier than he had expected. "Forty," Barry guessed, glancing at her wavy, dark hnlr, nnd then realized real-ized that she must be more than that She looked very much like her son, Barry thought Curious. That was the stronger strain, then, even though she seemed as soft and gentle as her husband was hard and domineering. She was a small woman, with ( plump arms, and tiny wrists and i ankles. She had lnrge, brown eyes, with shadows under them. They had shown suffering, those eyes, though they were bright enough I now. "Snappy," Barry described them. : My wife," Ridder nodded toward --Jier, curtly. I She came forward, her hand extended ex-tended to Barry. I "I want to thank yon," she said. ; Before Barry could answer, Rld-, Rld-, jder asked, "Why didn't you tell me I 'you'd left all this at Southampton?" j I "All what?" j I "Yonr accounts," Mrs. Ridder ex-i ex-i jplalned. "Evans gave them to me I this morning, but I didn't open the jenvelope until Just now. Then I .brought It straight to Mr. Ridder." ', "What's this mummery about .paying your board? . ;, . Come In, IMIss Hambldge." I Miss Hamlmlge was "ln.1 '"iluuimery ?" "Play acting," Ridder snapped. "I observed that you'd feathered your nest. I was wrong. Why didn't you say so?" "I did." The old man was looking at Barry's Bar-ry's check. "Can you write?" he asked. "I don't know." "Harwood thinks you can. He just left here. He says you earned what we paid you. Well, you'd better bet-ter go on earning It." "You mean I'm hired " "Hired?"- Ridder repeated. "You were hired two months ago. Who ever fired you?" There didn't seem to be any answer an-swer to that. "Mr. Ridder wants you to work with Jack," Mrs. Ridder remarked. "Keep an eye on him." "You're going to take Jack " "We're taking him home tonight. And Peggy. We hope you'll come out sometimes." "I want Jack to carry on," Ridder Rid-der declared, "when I'm through." He was back at his desk now, and he looked up, almost smiling. "You said I was a tough bird," he told Barry. "I heard you. Don't apologize. The world needs tough birds. You don't win battles with pigeons. Somebody's got to do a little clear thinking. Somebody's cot to know what he's about. We're a soft race. Coddled. Self-Indul- gent. We need hard going and discipline." dis-cipline." His voice was crisp and sure. "What's the matter with this young generation? It's fathers had too much money. I was a tough bird because I knew the fight Jack had made, nnd I didn't help him. I'd tried that, hadn't I? The other way was my only chance to make a man of my son." There was no lack of emotion In his tone now. "And you. How did I know you weren't just a cheap swindler? By listening to a lot of warm-hearted generalities? How did I know you weren't a blackmailer until I saw you were going to give yourself up without squealing?" "Then you were play-acting?" "Not on your life. I was watching watch-ing you like a hawk, but there was a cop out there, and 1 thought you had a date with him, until I saw your face when I asked you why you sent that wireless to Mrs. Ridder." Rid-der." Again, he almost smiled. "There was a cop waiting behind that door, and a girl behind that one. A nice girl. I had to be sure I wasn't messing things up for her." He glanced at his watch. "Four o'clock. You people have got to get out of here. I can't Then, Pat Said, "I Love You." spend the day being a sentimental Idiot" "You're neither," Mrs. Ridder said. "Neither what?" "Neither sentlmetal nor an Idiot. You're a 'tough bird,' but I like 'em that way." She was holding on to his arm when Barry closed the big door behind be-hind them. Barry thought she was crying. "She Is my mother, after all '." Barry thought. "She's all the mother moth-er I ever had." ne told Wlnslow most of It, late that same afternoon. Peter sat at his desk, looklns restless and tired, but happier than he had seemed In some time. "Pat said she wns going to propose pro-pose to you," lie smiled. "Meant It. too; we knew tli.it. Women are funny. Snooted you while things were going riulit. didn't she?'1 Barry laT v "I was coming back for her when I got out of Jail." "Your dope on the old man was all wrong," Winslow commented. "He has been cold and hungry. Trucked on a dock once. And as to being 'nuts about anybody,' can't you see that's why he went Into reverse re-verse when the boy disappointed him?" He opened the right top drawer of his desk, probing its Inscrutable jumble for something to play with. "You had a close calL though. Ridder Rid-der knew what he owed you. People Peo-ple forgive what you do to them, but rarely what you do for them." "You've done an awful lot for me, all right" "Nonsense !" The top drawer hadn't yielded anything promising and Peter picked up his little red magnet . "It's all ended well," he remarked re-marked ; "even for Luis Morano. He cheated the chair, and that's what he wanted to do." "I thought you were so sure of his Innocence." "His Innocence of this crime, yes," Peter answered. Then he rose and touched the magnet to his thermometer. "When are you sailing?" "Wednesday." "Good luck," Barry said, extending extend-ing his hand across the desk. Peter turned to take It, freeing his own hand by trying to slip the magnet over the hook from which the thermometer hung. The magnet promptly fell Into the open desk drawer. "Damn!" Peter exclaimed, probing prob-ing again. He retrieved, it at last, from somewhere near the bottom of that astounding accumulation of rubber bands, pen-wipers, and what not. Clinging to the metal, held by Its magnetic attraction, was another bit of metal As Peter dropped the magnet onto his desk, that other bit of metal detached de-tached Itself, and fell almost at Barry's feet Barry picked It up, looked at It looked again, and then looked at Peter. Peter was staring at him. Barry took a notebook out of his pocket "A 6G152," he said. "Yes, that's Kelly's latch-key." Peter nodded. "I must have thrown It here weeks ago and forgotten It" "I'd throw It somewhere else now," Barry advised. "Somewhere Just a little bit safer. Well, good luck, again, and good-by." He had reached the door when Peter said: "Wait a minute." Barry waited. "How long have you known?" "That you killed Mike Kelly?" Barry asked. "Since last Thursday. Thurs-day. I was on the train coming In from Southampton, and I'd just read of Morano's death. 'One of my suspects was guilty,' I thought. 'Peter Wlnslow can't laugh that off.'" He was back In the room now. "I remembered," he went on, "how you did laugh when I suggested Morano. Mo-rano. And how sure you were that I was wrong about every one else. But you never said anything that might've started me on the right track. On the contrary, when I asked you If there was a Mrs. Kelly, you answered, 'Yes. She sued for divorce recently and withdrew with-drew the case.' You'd Just read that In the Herald Tribune, and the same sentence revealed that, at the time of the murder. Mrs. Kellv was In Harlem. But you didn't mention men-tion that. Why? Only one explanation explana-tion occurred to me, and that was your willingness to keep me on the trail of some one who couldn't possibly pos-sibly be convicted." Barry sat down again, the other side of the desk. ' "Go on," Peter urged. "I'm very much Interested." He was. sitting, too, now. "My Interest," he continued, "Is strangely Impersonal. Almost wholly professional. I think It Is. That's very curious. I'm Just a criminal lawyer Interested In a crime." His weariness explained that, Barry thought. As Hambldge had been, and Morano, and Barry himself him-self when talking with Ridder, Peter Pe-ter Wlnslow was "glad It's over." "As a criminal lawyer," Barry said, "and a shrewd one, you'd be surprised to know how much you overlooked. Bits of evidence that fitted like a jig-saw puzzle the mo ment suspicion started anyone putting put-ting them together." "As, for Instance?" Barry smiled. "You told me Morano phoned you at one o'clock the morning of the murder 'to say that one of his girls was In Jail.' and would you 'take the case.' But Peggy wasn't in Jail, at one o'clock. She'd been released hours before, and Morano knew It. I knew that he did phone you. What about? Why, about Kelly's visit to the Coconnut Bar, of course, and the threat of something In his pocket that was not only a menace to Morano but Kelly's hold over Judge Hambldge. A paper every one seemed to want, and that had disappeared when the body was found. "What had that paper to do with you? "If this wore a detective story, and you read it. you'd find twenty answers to that question. Judge UanibMire said he couldn't toil the truth because of a woman. Par said the woman was her d.v.d r'.: Iht. And plainly, th.it had s.-ir.eilii:;; to do w ith Morano." He leaned forward across the desk. "I couldn't see any link between the two. And then I remembered that Pat's mother was your wife's sister. Pat told me her mother was 'brought up in a little town called Warrenton.' That meant your wife came from Warrenton, too. And Morano had told me he came from Fauquier county. I went to my atlas. Warrenton's In Fauquier county. coun-ty. There used to be a military school there. Mrs. Winslow ran away with her first husband while he was a cadet in a military school." Peter leaned forward, too. "And Morano " he began tensely. "I don't know whether Morano went to a military school or not "But George Selby did. "Morano and George Selby were the same man, weren't they?" "Yes, the same," Peter said. "I was sure of it," Barry resumed. re-sumed. "The papers reported that Selby was drowned In Philadelphia. Philadel-phia. But the body they Identified had been In the water two weeks. Fresh water. So that identification didn't amount to much. Violet Fane tisSS J ' , pi , i ; 3 i, i ! n-. -i : & vt f "I Doped That Out, Too." had told me Morano bought the house down town because he was 'married onct,' and he and his wife lived there. The sob-story I dug out of the tabloids said Selby was 'blissfully happy' with his bride in a house he'd rented down town. Obviously, the same house. Sentimental? Senti-mental? Yes, but Morano was a sentimental cuss. So sentimental that he might have died rather than have it discovered that your wife was really his wife." Barry saw Peter wince, but went on. "Of course, he had another reason rea-son for resisting arrest that 'hot spot' with which Kelly threatened him. If Morano had been arrested, and finger-printed, they'd've learned that he was George Selby, and wanted for murder. Morano made certain of that. The 2:12 train he caught at the Penn station went to Philadelphia. That's where he was all the next day checking up on the finger-prints, taken when Selby was sent to the State penitentiary, and, perhaps, trying, through underground under-ground channels, to have them removed re-moved from the files. "I had the motive for the murder now. "Kelly knew Morano was Selby, and so that your wife was tech nically a bigamist. That was the threat he held over Morano, and Judge Hambldge. The threat that persuaded the Judge to write a 'crooked decision.' The paper Kelly Kel-ly had in his pocket was a marriage certificate, or something of the sort, he'd found somewhere." "In an old trunk," Peter said; "in the house he bought at 24 Jefferson street" Barry nodded. "I doped that out, too. Both Morano Mo-rano and Hambidge had plenty of reason to kill Kelly. "But neither had as much reason as you had. "If you knew of the existence of that paper. "And you did,' didn't you? That's where Morano's telephone message came In. That's why he called you up from the Cocoanut Bar. To tell you he'd seen the paper, and Kellj had it." "Right," Winslow said, simply. "My Inquiry was narrowing dowr to you and Morano. But how die either of you get In to Kelly? Ant' then I remembered that, the daj I first saw Mrs. Kelly, she canit Into that house and left her key U the door. I did the same thing this week. Anybody might. Kspeciallj a drunken man. That would ex plain why the key wasn't on Kelly'! body. It would explain how oui third caller entered w hile Kelly wa: talking to Judge Hambidge." "Right," Winslow repeated. "Was the third caller you o Morano? And then I rememberet two things. Morano took the 2:1: to Philadelphia to check on thosi finger-prints. He wouldn't've dom that If he'd know-n Kelly was dead The house was dark and siien when Morano got to Sixteent street He thought Kelly'd gone ti bed, and so he went to Philadelphia I was sure of that. And I was sur that the man who killed Kelly wor gloves. (TO HE C0T1XLT.D) |