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Show Synthetic Gentle 7?i a?i L CHANNING fl 7 POLLOCK- , ASiCH CcWZMT, ChAX'A.'Xci POLLOCK WNU SERVICE CHAPTER VII 10 TUKY wore curiously liu-rt little lit-tle croup for a niluuto or two i after the rovolatUm. ; It was like ft jilay, Harry thought; curtain ilown on a climax, mul the ju-tors relating until It sluuiM rise s:iln (or the not scone. J" After time, Harry closed the room to the pair. L l'at turned on hlin. ! Well, now you know," she said, k "Von know about us, hut remoiuher we know ahout you. too.-' -V She was herself asaln; hard ami S- defiant. lutiorins her, for the lnomeut. Parry, askevl the Jiule, "lo you want to toll me what happened?" "1 wrote my opinion In the Jef-i,, Jef-i,, forson street proceedings, and then, ajaln as you Say. 1 couldn't so llirou.ih with It. I'd never done a crooked thing In my life. I don't T' know how I ever made that speech at the Astor. The Instant It was ,. tinisheJ, I telephoned Kelly. "You'd t-, better come down and talk It over," he said. s "Of course. It would have been " fatal for anyone to learn of that meeting. That's why I got out of the tail at Tweuty-thlrd street. As I toIJ you, Kelly admitted me himself. him-self. He was drunk, and In a had temper. 'What's the matter with you?' he asked", when we'd gone Into the drawing room. 'Whlte- livered? Here; take a drink, and J forget It.' u, "There was a bottle on the table, s and two glasses. Poth of 'em had been used, but he half-filled them. and gave me one. I needed It, but " I can't drink Scotch never could. r I told Kelly so, and he blazed out at me. 'You're too good to drink with me is that It?' "'No,' I answered: 'that's not It. F.ut 1 can't hand down that deol- sion. 1 simply can't, Mr. Kelly. It's rotten, and everyone knows It. I've " get the cursed thing In my pocket. 1 and ' " 'And I've got something In my pocket,' he shouted " "Fatherl" Pat intervened. "For over an hour, I pleaded and argued. And Kelly kept drinking, and getting uglier, fie was a big ' man. with a bull neck, and huge ' ' hands. At last, he said, 'Shut your , damned mouth, and get out of , ' here!' ''I said, 'I'm not going.' , "'No?' he sneered, and got up from his chair. He stumbled across the room to a great, old-fashioned desk, and got a revolver. 'Now, beat it,' he yelled, 'and damned quick!' j "'All right,' I said, 'but I won't . file that decision." "I walked Into the hall, and Kelly i , stood, leaning against the door, with the pistol In his hand, so furious furi-ous that I half expected him to shoot before I could get my hat. 'ou think y00 can scare me,' he shouted. Ton and The Globe. You i think yon got something on me. j'j Witnesses. Squealers. Well, I know I how to take care of them, by God! 1 Feat It! And, if that decision ain't i?J filed by noon, today, I'll ' " '1 Again, Pat said. "Father!" yj "I know,- Flambidge interrupted -dj himself. Pat's admonition had come Just j0 In time, Parry thought. The Judge - f had risen, tense, and so excited that 7 be seemed on the verge of collapse. "And that was that," Barry calmed him. fi "Not quite," Judge Hambidge continued, con-tinued, but In a lower tone. "When I got to the bottom of the steps J the stone steps. I mean I stood thinking. If I ieft that wayi there was no telling what Kelly might do. 'ye got to go through,' I thought. 'It's ruin either way, but, if I obey orders, ruin only for me. I'd better bet-ter trii-a l t t - . , .. m. i couiun t make up y mind, though. I kept looking DMck, half decided. And, suddenly. Queer thing happened. The front door swung open." The Judge mopped his hands again. "I'd shut It carefully," he resumed, bt there it was, wide, almost like aB? ti 'nv,tation- I walked into the hall. "e f;lass 'loors to the drawing room fcrf were closed, but I could see the pU "-'"t through them. When I put n,y hand on the knob, the lights n'ent out. I turned the knob, and fished, but the door wouldn't "ren. Not latched it was as if rne one was holding It. 'Kelly,' I thought. .IIe won,t et me ,n 'rve to act quick now.' Almost In a -az?, I wandered up to the avenue. EL.' At nine o'clock, I gave the decision to my cierki and t()J hm (o fi,e t "mediately. A few hours later, I learned that Kelly was dead. The J, I'-'pers said his body was found Mri-tdie,! ar-ross that door to the U- 1 k"-'w then it was there when 1 the house, mid that was why I couldn't open the door." l'at said, "Are you satlslW'd?" "Are you?" Parry asked. "Or would you rather that 1 tried to find who killed Kelly?" "What does It matter " Pat began, be-gan, hotly, "It think Mr. Gilbert's answered that question," the Judge Interrupted. Interrupt-ed. "We've got to clour young Hid-dor. Hid-dor. At any cost, Pat. we've got to clear him." "Mr. Gilbert's our friend," her father fa-ther went on. "lie says so, and I believe hlin." "What do you want to know, Mr Gilbert?" "How long did you stand at the foot of the steps before that door swung open?" "hive minutes. Maybe, a little more." "Po you think some one opened It? Some one who, then, went in to Kelly?" "You mean, the murderer?" Parry nodded. -No. That's the last thing he would have done. The door prob ably didn't latch when I closed It." "While you were In the house, did you see anyone but Kelly?" "No. We were shut In together." "IMd you hear anyone?" "Since you mention it, once I did think a heard the front door close. I may have Imagined It, but now I remoiuher Kelly asked, "Who's that in the hall?' It was about half an hour after we went into the drawing draw-ing room, and I looked out, but there wasn't anyone." "Ho or she may have gone Into the dining room." Parry fald. "Whoever killed Kelly came out of the dining room; I'm certain of that." "Why?" "Peoau.se the drink Kelly offered you was Scotch whisky. Was there anything else In the room?" "If there had b-en, I'd've asked f..r It." "F.xaetly. And the weapon that crushed Kelly's skull was a cut-glas.s cut-glas.s decanter containing rye whisky. "In the five minutes you were standing on the pavement," Parry reasoned, "some one came out of that dining room with that decanter, decan-ter, and struck Kelly. There was no time for a quarrel. That man or that woman knew what he or she was going to do." "Why do you say 'she'?" Pat asked. "This wasn't a woman's crime." "It's not a criminal's crime, either," ei-ther," P.arry answered. "A criminal crim-inal would have brought the weapon, weap-on, and It wo.uldn't've been a cut-glass cut-glass decanter. A criminal might have worn gloves, to prevent leaving leav-ing finger-prints. Put, Bince this wasn't a criminal, the fact that there were no finger-prints suggests that the murderer Just happened to be wearing gloves." "And?" Pat Inquired, tensely. "And men don't often wear gloves on a warm night Women do. It was a warm night." "It was very warm," the Judge said. "Yon are a shrewd young man," the girl gibed at him. "But your assumptions are ridiculous. Gloves! Anyone might have worn 'em. Anyone Any-one might remember the risk of leaving finger-prints, and wipe them off a bottle with a handkerchief. Anyone might've come In through an unlatcned door any time after my father left." "But," Barry objected, "Kelly was dead then." "IIow do you know that? How do we know my father wasn't right when he thought Kelly was keeping him out? All your conjectures lead nowhere, Mr. Gilbert. The only discovers dis-covers vou've made Is that father saw Kelly after young Itldder did. And, ns I told you, that's merely Implicating one Innocent man Instead In-stead of another." "And you" "Naturally, it's the second innocent inno-cent man I care about. Especially since his Innocence of murder wouldn't keep your disclosures from disgracing him." Her voice broke. "Uldder'll be free In a few weeks," she pled. "Wait, Mr. Gilbert. You don't know how many Innocent i.'0-ple i.'0-ple you may drag Into this." Barry hesitated. He now remembered that he had told Pat he loved her. "It didn't get me anywhere," Barry thought. "It never will. I'm not even sure that she heard me, but I'm glad I spoke, all the same." Aloud, he said, 'Til wait, Pat." She glanced at him gratefully. "Not until the trial, though," he warned her. "I won't take that chance. I won't let this girl. Peggy, go on suffering until then. But now 1 believe J know who murdered Ivellv. .Nomoiiiio who came lnlo lie Iioiko while your father was there. Someone no full ()f l,o Might of It that she bungled the new lock on the front door." "You think " llnmhldgo begun. "1 think that's why It blew open. And 1 think, too, that revealing your visit - now would bo merely 'tipping our hand.' The person 1 suspect has already covered her tracks pretty well." "Then," Pat mild almost Incredulously Incredu-lously "Then you're not going to repeat this story?" "Not even to Wlnslow. Ho hasn't much inoro faith In my 'sleuthing' than you have. We'll leave hlin to work out Kidder's defense. For the present let's agree on an armistice. armis-tice. Mutual silence. If the time arrives when 1 feel I must speak, I'll come to you first. Is that fair?" "Quito." l'"roin the very beginning, Parry had suspected Mrs. Kelly. "She sued for divorce recently, and withdrew with-drew the case," Peter Wlnslow had told hlin. "P, you think that might Indicate that she killed her husband?" hus-band?" Parry did, and one discovery dis-covery after another confirmed the idea. "'Put," as Parry had reminded remind-ed his city editor, "Mrs. Kelly was In-Harlem. She went to a dunce." "Kver hear of faking an alibi?" Garwood had asked, advising a "chock up." That sounded promising until, as the first move in his Investigation, Parry dug up The Herald Tribune of "the morning after the body was found." Mrs. Kelly had told hlin that paper contained a full record of her social activities, and it did. "At the tlmo of the murder, Mrs. Kelly, who sued for divorce recently, re-cently, and withdrew the case, was awarding prizes at a fancy dress ball of the (.'rosstown Chowder and Hutlng club in llarloin Gardens. This was at midnight, and the other Judges were . . ." "Kelly wasn't killed at midnight," Parry realized, "lie wasn't killed until two hours after midnight. If Mrs. Kelly got through with her prizes " "Well," Parry exulted, climbing Into the subway. What next? Say nothing, and saw wood that's what." Monday morning Barry dropped In on Peter Wlnslow. Obviously, he was doing a great deal. "Gut the defense all planned." he dwlared. showing Barry a thick sheaf of "It's Not a Criminal's Crime, Either," Ei-ther," Barry Answered. memoranda. "Loose-leaf memoranda memo-randa It was, In the most literal sense scrawled on waste paper and the backs of envelopes. Order may be Nature's first law, but It wasn't this lawyer's. "No, I'm not neat," refer smiled, intercepting Barry's glance. "Except "Ex-cept personally, and that Is Julie's achievement. Julie's Mrs. Wlnslow, of course, and she buys all my clothes. Lays 'em out for me, too even the boutonniere. I often ask her If she wants me to look like a gigolo. Don't worry about this stuff, though," indicating indicat-ing the sheaf of memoranda. "Miss Clark'll have that straight by night." Miss Clark was his secretary. "Women keep you in order," he went on smiling; "that's about the only thing I have against 'em." "There's nothing to this case," he continued. "It'll come to trial in a few weeks now, and be over in a few hours. Want to hear what I'm going to ask that Filipino?" Fili-pino?" Listening, Barry felt again that his own activities had been merely foolish. A dozen questions disposed dis-posed of all the evidence the butler but-ler had given so far, and made it apparent that what he actually knew of young Rldder's visit was actually nothing. "You heard a quarrel? A violent quarrel? And you were alarmed? That's why you came upstairs? Rogers left then? And the lights were still burning in the front room. If you were alarmed, why didn't you knock at the door to make sure your master mas-ter was all' right? Not so very much alarmed, were you? In fact, you weren't alarmed at all until you saw what had happened." This was the beginning of an Inquiry that twisted about, doubled on itself, and was likely to leave any Jury on earth uncertain to convict anyone of a capital offense. "Particularly anyone with a wife and child," Peter Pe-ter said. "Peggy was In here Friday," ho added. "Shu looks na though she'd I n dragged through a knot hole. I wanted her to come In us for the week end, bill we're In town most of the time I'm going to talk to the Hninhldgcs about having her out there." "That would be greal," Parry kindled. "They'd ho company for each olbi'r. It wouldn't do Pat a lilt of harm to learn how tho oilier half lives." "Right I" Peter exclaimed heartily. heart-ily. "I'll call Put today." In spite of himself, as he was leaving, leav-ing, Parry mentioned his llarleiu theory. Peter listened Intently. "Well," be said, "you are a Hawk-shaw." Hawk-shaw." "You'd he surprised if I landed Mrs. Kelly, wouldn't you?" "No," Peter replied, smiling again, "hut I'd be terribly surprised If you didn't begin suspecting some ono else ten minutes ufter-ward." CHAPTER VIII T1II0 more Parry thought of It, (he more certain he became that tho Judge's story, and the revelations revela-tions In Harlem, removed the only reason for questioning Harwood's hypothesis. When the divorce action ac-tion was tiled, Kelly had promised not to see Petty Parclay again. That promise hail Induced the withdrawal with-drawal of the petition. And then Petty Parclay had phoned, while Kelly was out, and Just as Mrs. Kelly Kel-ly was going. In Harwood's own words, Mrs. Kelly "went wild." Fulling to get legal counsel, she taxied to Harlem, and there she got "madder and madder." Just after midnight, she drove home, anil found Kelly alone drunk, and with the accumulated wrath engendered by two trying Interview There were words, ami a handy decanter. The design began being uliuirst too nearly perfect. He found Peggy doing some mending mend-ing In her dingy room. She had lost llesli, and seemed to be always staring at nothing. "It's Jacky." she confided in Parry. "I'm worried about him." The youngster looked pule and HI. "Look here, Peg; will you have lunch wltn me tomorrow at the Astor? As-tor? I want you to meet somebody." some-body." "Miss Hambidge?" "Yes." "She'd turn up her nose at me like an elephant reaching for peanuts." pea-nuts." "I don't think so. Anyway, I want you to know each other." The appointment was made, at last one o'clock nnd Parry called Pat. "Well, the trail's hot, all right." "Tell me about It." "1 don't dare over the wire. Yon know; operators. Come In and lunch with me:" "When?" "Tomorrow at one." Pat was eagerly anxious to hear his news, nnd there was no other way. Put, If Pat's nose remained static when she lenrned she was to encounter Peggy, her mouth straightened. "Why? What have I In common with this girl?" "Well," Barry answered, flatly, "you're keeping her husband in prison." Pat flushed. "Y'ou owe her something for that, don't you think? What're you being be-ing so high hat about? This girl's Mrs. John Clarke Rldder, Jr., you know." "I'm not being high hat Only, naturally. Just now, I don't feel much like meeting strangers. Especially Es-pecially strangers with whom I have no community of Interest" Lunching together, however, It soon became evident that there was a "community of interest." Pnt warmed to this painted chorus girl, fearful for her husband exactly as Pat was fearful for her father. Both heard Barry's account of his discoveries with regard to Mrs. Kelly. "It seems pretty conclusive," Pat said. "I never thought of that dame I mean, woman," Peg added. "Would that get Jack off quick?" Barry explained his understanding understand-ing that, If there were definite proof of another person's having committed commit-ted a crime, anyone in custody was released Immediately. "The district attorney moves for a dismissal of the Indictment, I believe," he told them. "Gee !" Peggy said, with the tears In her eyes. Pat was no fool, and she found herself respecting and liking this "night club hoofer." She was Mrs. Kidder, after all. "Whoever the girl might have been, it was the tears beginning to dissolve the beads that stirred Pat. She had never seen anyone cry that way before cry with her lips twisted Into a smile. "You've certainly stuck to your husband," Pat observed. "Why not? When you really love anybody, you don't care what they do, or have done, or what they are. It's what they are to you that counts. You're not thinking what you're going to get, but what you're going to give. That is, the right kind of girl is." (TO BE CONTINUED) |
