Part 14

"Certainly," said Vandervent. "But--I'm an officer of the law, Judge."

"Does that mean that you won't help Miss Deane? Good God! You aren't going to let a young woman's name be dragged through a filthy mess like this, are you?"

"Not if I can help it," said Vandervent.

"That's better," grunted the judge. "But how do you expect to help it, though?"

"By finding the real murderer."

"When?" roared Walbrough. "To-day?"

Vandervent colored again.

"As soon as possible. I don't know when. But to shut up the boy--think it over, Judge. He works for the Vandervent estate, it's true. But I don't own his soul, you know. Think of the opportunities for blackmail we give him. It's impossible, Judge--and unnecessary. If Spofford goes to him again, it's the elevator-boy's word against yours. Worthless!"

"And you, of course, knowing that I lied, would feel compelled, as an officer of the law----"

"I'd feel compelled to do nothing!" snapped Vandervent. "Your word would be taken unreservedly by the district attorney's office. The matter ends right there."

"Unless," said the judge softly, "the boy goes to a newspaper. In which case, his charge and my alibi would be printed. And five directors of the Metals and Textiles Bank would immediately recollect that I had been present at a meeting on Tuesday afternoon between the hours of one and six. Likewise, thirty-odd ladies, all present at Mrs. Rayburn's bridge, would remember that my wife had been at Mrs. Rayburn's house all of Tuesday afternoon." He groaned. "I had to think of something, Vandervent. I told the first lie that popped into my head. Our alibi for Miss Deane will go crashing into bits once it's examined, once there's the least publicity. Publicity! That's all that Miss Deane fears, all that we fear for her. Scandal! We've got to stop that."

"Exactly; we _will_ stop it," said Vandervent. "There's a way." Oddly, he blushed vividly as he spoke. "I know of one way--but we won't dwell on that just now. I--I have a right--to suppress information that--that I don't think is essential to the enforcing of justice. I--I--if the suppressing of the elevator-man would work good for Miss Deane, I would see to his suppression. Because I know her to be innocent."

"Well, what are you going to do?" demanded the judge.

Vandervent shrugged.

"It's not an offhand matter, Judge. We must think."

They thought. But Clancy's thoughts traveled far afield from the tremendous issue that confronted her. Mentally, she was comparing Randall and Vandervent, trying to find out what it was in Randall that, during the past few hours, had depressed her, aroused her resentment.

"You see," said Vandervent finally, "the relations between the Police Department and the district attorney's office are rather strained at the moment. If the police should happen to learn, in any way, that we've been conducting an independent investigation into the Beiner murder and that we'd dropped it----"

"Where would they learn it?" asked the judge. His brusqueness had left him. With a little thrill that might have been amazement, Clancy noted that the few minutes' silence had somehow caused Judge Walbrough to drop into a secondary place; Vandervent now seemed to have taken command of the situation.

"Spofford," answered Vandervent.

"Would he dare?" asked the judge.

Vandervent laughed.

"Even the lowly plain-clothes man plays politics. There'll be glory of a sort for the man who solves the Beiner mystery. If Spofford finally decides that he is by way of being close to the solution, I don't believe that he can be stopped from telling it to the police or the newspapers."

"And you don't see any way of stopping Spofford?" asked the judge.

"He may have been convinced by your story," Vandervent suggested.

The judge shook his head.

"His conviction won't last."

Vandervent shrugged.

"In that case-- Well, we can wait."

Clancy interjected herself into the conversation.

"You won't really just simply wait? You'll be trying to find out who really killed Mr. Beiner?"

"You may be sure of that," said Vandervent. "You see"--and he shrugged again--"we become one-idea'd a bit too easily in the district attorney's office. It's a police habit, too. We know that a young woman had been in Beiner's office, that Beiner had had an engagement to take a young woman over to a film-studio. We discovered a card introducing a Miss Ladue to Beiner. From its position on Beiner's desk, we dared assume that the young woman of the studio appointment was this Miss Ladue. Our assumptions were correct, it seems. But we didn't stop at that assumption; we assumed that she was the murderess. We were wrong there."

Clancy's bosom lifted at his matter-of-fact statement. With so much evidence against her, and with this evidence apparently corroborated by her flight, it was wonderful to realize that not a single person to whom she had told her story doubted it.

"And, because we believed that we had hit upon the correct theory, we dropped all other ends of the case," continued Vandervent. "Now, with the case almost a week old--oh, we'll get him--or her--all right," he added hastily. "Only--the notoriety that may occur first----" He broke off abruptly.

Clancy's bosom fell; her hopes also. The palms of her hands became moist. In the presence of Vandervent, she realized more fully than ever what notoriety might mean. Vandervent sensed her horror.

"But I assure you, Miss Deane, that we'll avoid that notoriety. I know a way----"

"What?" demanded the judge.

"Well, we'll wait a bit," said Vandervent. "Meanwhile, I'm going to the office."

"On Sunday?" asked Mrs. Walbrough. Vandervent smiled faintly.

"I think I'll be forgiven--considering the cause for which I labor," he finished. He was rewarded by a smile from Clancy that brought the color to his cheeks.

And then, the blush still lingering, he left them. Walbrough escorted him to the door. He returned, a puzzled look upon his face.

"Well, I wonder what he means by saying that he knows a way to keep the thing out of the papers."

"You're an idiot!" snapped his wife "Why--any one ought to know what he means."

The judge ran his fingers across the top of his head.

"'Any one ought to know,' eh? Well, I'm one person that doesn't."

"You'll find out soon enough," retorted Mrs. Walbrough. She turned to Clancy. "Come along, dear; you must lie down."

Randall, whose silence during the past half-hour had been conspicuous, opened his mouth.

"Why--er----," he began.

But Mrs. Walbrough cut him off.

"You'll forgive Miss Deane, won't you?" she pleaded. "She's exhausted, poor thing, though she doesn't know it."

Indeed, Clancy didn't know it, hadn't even suspected it. But she could offer no protest. Mrs. Walbrough was dominating the situation as Vandervent had been doing a few moments ago. She found herself shaking hands with Randall, thanking him, telling him that her plans necessarily were uncertain, but adding, with the irrepressible Clancy grin, that, if she weren't here, she'd certainly be in jail where any one could find her, and bidding him good-by. All this without knowing exactly why. Randall deserved better treatment. Yet, queerly enough, she didn't want to accord it to him.

A little later, she was uncorseted and lying down in a Walbrough guest bedroom, a charming room in soft grays that soothed her and made her yearn for night and sleep. Just now she wasn't the least bit sleepy, but she yielded to Mrs. Walbrough's insistence that she should rest.

Mrs. Walbrough, leaving her guest, found her husband in his study; he was gravely mixing himself a cocktail. She surveyed him with contempt. Mildly he looked at her.

"What have I done now?" he demanded.

"Almost rushed that poor girl into a marriage," she replied.

"'Marriage?' God bless me--what do you mean?"

"Asking again and again what Phil Vandervent meant when he said that he knew a way to avoid publicity. And then you didn't have sense enough to edge young Randall out of the house. You let me be almost rude to him."

"Well, why should I have been the one to be rude? Why be rude, anyway? He's been darned nice to the girl."

"That's just it! Do you want her to keep thinking how nice he is?"

"Well, in the name of heaven, why not?" demanded her exasperated husband.

"Because he's not good enough for her."

"Why isn't he?"

"Because she can do better."

The judge drained his cocktail.

"Mrs. Walbrough, do you know I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about?"

"Of course you haven't! You'd have let her stay here and listen, maybe, to a proposal from that young man, and perhaps accept it, and possibly----"

"Peace!" thundered the judge. "No more supposes,' please. I'll not be henpecked in my own house."

She came close to him and put her arm about him.

"Where shall I henpeck you then, Tommy boy?" she asked.

"'Tommy boy! Tommy boy?' O my good Lord, what talk!" sputtered the judge. But he kissed her as she lifted her mouth to his.

XXV

Familiarity breeds endurance as well as contempt. Clancy ate as hearty a breakfast on Monday morning as any criminal that ever lived, and, according to what one reads, condemned criminals on the morning of execution have most rapacious appetites. Which is not so odd as people think; how can they know when they're going to eat again?

She had been in New York one week, lacking a few hours, and in that week she had run the scale of sensation. She did not believe that she could ever be excited again. No matter what came, she believed that she would have fortitude to endure it.

The judge and his wife seemed to have banished alarm. Indeed, they had seemed to do that last night, for when Mrs. Walbrough had permitted Clancy to rise for dinner, she had conducted her to a meal at which no talk of Clancy's plight had been permitted to take place. Later, the three had played draw-pitch, a card game at which Clancy had shown what the judge was pleased to term a "genuine talent."

Then had come bed. And now, having disposed of a breakfast that would have met the approval of any resident of Zenith, she announced that she was going out.

"Better stay indoors," said the judge. "Just as well, you know, if people don't see you too much."

Clancy laughed.

"I've been outdoors right along," she said. "It's rather a late date to hide indoors. Besides, I mustn't lose my job."

"Job!" The judge snorted disgustedly.

"Why, you mustn't think of work until this matter is all settled!" cried Mrs. Walbrough.

Clancy smiled.

"I must live, you know."

"'Live! Live!'" The judge lifted an empty coffee-cup to his mouth, then set it down with a crash that should have broken it. "Don't be absurd, my dear girl. Mrs. Walbrough and I----"

"Please!" begged Clancy. She fought against tears of gratitude--of affection. "You've been so dear, so--so--'angelic' is the only word that fits it. Both of you. I'll adore you--always. But you mustn't--I didn't come to New York to let other people, no matter how sweet and generous they might be, do for me."

The judge cleared his throat.

"Quite right, my dear; quite right."

"Of course she is," said Mrs. Walbrough.

Clancy hid her mirth. It is a wonderful thing to realize that in the eyes of certain people we may do no wrong, that, whatever we do, even though these certain people have advised against it, becomes suddenly the only correct, the only possible course. And to think that she had known the Walbroughs only a few days!

Fate had been brutal to her these past seven days; but Fate had also been kindly.

"But you'll continue to make this your home--for the present, at least," said the judge. "Until this affair is closed."

To have refused would have been an unkindness. They wanted her. Clancy was one of those persons who would always be wanted.

The judge, as she was leaving, wrote on a card his private-office telephone-number.

"If you got the listed one, you might have difficulty in speaking with me. But this wire ends on my desk. I answer it myself."

Clancy thanked him. Mrs. Walbrough kissed her, and the judge assumed a forlorn, abused expression. So Clancy kissed him also.

A servant stopped her in the hall.

"Just arrived, Miss Deane," she said, putting in Clancy's hand a long box, from one end of which protruded flower-stems. Clancy had never been presented with "store" flowers before. In Zenith, people patronize a florist only on sorrowful occasions.

And now, gazing at the glorious red roses that filled the box, Clancy knew that she would never go back to Zenith. She had known it several times during the past week, but to-day she knew it definitely, finally. With scandal hovering in a black cloud over her, she still knew it. These roses were emblematic of the things for which she had come to New York. They stood for the little luxuries, the refinements of living that one couldn't have in a country town. Had the greatest sage in the world come to Clancy now and told her of what little worth these things were in comparison with the simpler, truer things of the country, Clancy would have laughed at him. How could a man be expected to understand? Further, she wouldn't have believed him. She had seen meannesses in Zenith that its gorgeous sunsets and its tonic air could not eradicate from memory.

She turned back, and up-stairs found Mrs. Walbrough.

"I'll fix them for you," said the judge's wife.

But Clancy hugged the opened box to her bosom.

"These are the first flowers _from a florist's_ that I ever received," she said.

"Bless your heart!" said Mrs. Walbrough. "I'll even let you fill the vases." Mrs. Walbrough could remember the first flowers sent her by her first beau. "But you haven't read the card!" she cried.

Clancy colored. She hadn't thought of that. She picked up the envelope.

"Oh!" she gasped, when she had torn the envelope open and read the sender's name. And there were scribbled words below the engraved script: "To a brave young lady."

Mutely she handed the card to her hostess. Mrs. Walbrough smiled.

"He isn't as brave as you, my dear. Or else," she explained, "he'd have written, 'To a beautiful young lady.' Why," she cried, "that's what he started to write! Look! There's a blot, and it's scratched----"

Clancy's color was fiery.

"He wouldn't have!" she protested.

"Well, he didn't; but he wanted to," retorted Mrs. Walbrough.

Clancy gathered the roses in her arms. She could say nothing. Of course, it was absurd. Mrs. Walbrough had acquired a sudden and great fondness for her, and therefore was colored in her views. Still, there was the evidence. There is no letter "t" in brave, and undeniably there had been a "t" in the word that had preceded "young." She saw visions; she saw herself--she dismissed them. Mr. Philip Vandervent was a kindly, chivalrous young man and had done a thoughtful thing. That's all there was to it. She would be an idiot to read more into the incident. And yet, there had been a "t" in "brave" until he had scratched it out!

Her heart was singing as she left the Walbrough house. A score of Spoffords might have been lurking near and she would never have seen them.

Suddenly she thought of Randall. Why hadn't he thought of sending her roses? He had come back from Albany, cut short his trip to California to see her, to plead once more his cause. Her eyes hardened. He hadn't pleaded it very strongly. Suddenly she knew why she had been resentful yesterday--because she had sensed his refusal of her. Refusal! She offered to marry him, and--he'd said, "Wait."

But she could not keep her mind on him long enough to realize that she was unjust. The glamour of Vandervent overwhelmed her.

She walked slowly, and it was after nine when she arrived at Sally Henderson's office.

Her employer greeted her cordially.

"Easy job--though tiresome--for you to-day, Miss Deane," she said. "Sophie Carey has made another lightning change. Wants to rent her house furnished as quick as we can get a client. You've got to check her inventory. Hurry along, will you? Here!" She thrust into Clancy's hands printed slips of paper and almost pushed her employee toward the door.

Clancy caught a 'bus and rode as far as Eighth Street. On the way, she glanced at the printed slips. They were lists of about everything, she imagined, that could possibly be crowded into a house. The task had frightened her at first, but now it seemed simple.

Mrs. Carey's maid had evidently recovered from the indisposition of the other day, or else she had engaged a new one. Anyway, a young woman in apron and cap opened the door.

Yes; Mrs. Carey was in. In a moment, Clancy had verbal evidence of the fact, for she heard Sophie's voice calling to her. She entered the dining-room. Mrs. Carey was at breakfast. Her husband was with her, but that his breakfast was the ordinary sort Clancy was inclined to doubt. For by his apparently untouched plate stood a tall glass.

He rose, not too easily, as Clancy entered.

"Welcome to our city, little stranger!" he cried.

Clancy shot a glance at Sophie Carey. She was sorry for her. Mrs. Carey's face was white; she looked old.

"Going to find me a tenant?" she asked. Her attempt at joviality was rather pathetic.

"Take the house herself. Why not?" demanded Carey. "Nice person to leave it with. Take good care ev'rything. Make it pleasant for me when I run into town for a day or so. Nice, friendly li'l brunette to talk to. 'Scuse me," he suddenly added. "Sorry! Did I say anything I shouldn't, Sophie darling? I ask you, Miss Deane, did I say a single thing shouldn't've said. Tell me."

"No, indeed," said Clancy.

Her heart ached for Sophie Carey. A brilliant, charming, beautiful woman tied to a thing like this! Not that she judged Don Carey because of his intoxication. She was not too rigorous in her judgment of other people's weaknesses. She knew that men can become intoxicated and still be men of genius and strength. But Carey's weak mouth, too small for virility, his mean eyes, disgusted her. What a woman Mrs. Carey would make if the right man---- And yet she was drawn to her husband in some way or another. Possibly, Clancy decided, sheer loneliness made her endure him on those occasions when he returned from his wanderings.

Mrs. Carey rose.

"You'll excuse us, Don? Miss Deane must go over the house, you know."

"Surest thing! Go right 'long. 'F I can help, don't hes'tate t' call on me. Love help li'l brunette."

How they got out of the room, Clancy didn't know. She thought that Sophie Carey would faint, but she didn't. As for herself, the feeling that Don Carey's drunken eyes were appraising her figure nauseated her. She was so pitifully inclined toward Sophie that her eyes were blurry.

Up-stairs in her bedroom, Mrs. Carey met Clancy's eyes. She had been calm, self-controlled up to now. But the sympathy that she read in Clancy weakened her resolution. She sat heavily down upon the edge of the bed and hid her face in her hands.

"O my God, what shall I do?" she moaned.

Awkwardly, Clancy advanced to her. She put an arm about the older woman's shoulders.

"Please," she said, "you mustn't!"

Mrs. Carey's hands dropped to her side. Her eyes seemed to grow dry, as though she were controlling her tears by an effort of her will.

"I won't. The beast!" she cried. She rose, flinging off, though not rudely, Clancy's sympathetic embrace. "Miss Deane, don't you ever marry. Beasts--all of them!"

Clancy, with the memory of Vandervent's roses in her mind, shook her head.

"He--he just isn't himself, Mrs. Carey."

The other woman shrugged.

"'Not himself?' He _is_ himself. When he's sober, he's worse, because then one can make no excuses for him. To insult a guest in my house----"

"I don't mind," stammered Clancy. "I--I make allowances----"

"So have I. So have all my friends. But now--I'm through with him. I----" Suddenly she sat down again, before a dressing-table. "That isn't true. I've promised him his chance, Miss Deane. He shall have it. We're going to the country. He has a little place up in the Dutchess County. We're going there to-day. The good Lord only knows how we'll reach it over the roads, but--it's his only chance. It's his last. And I'm a fool to give it to him. He'll be sober, but--worse then. And still-- Hear him," she sneered.

Clancy listened. At first, she thought that it was mere maudlin speech, but as Don Carey's voice died away, she heard another voice--a mean, snarling voice.

"You think so, hey? Lemme tell you different. All I gotta do is to 'phone a cop, and----"

"Go ahead--'phone 'em," she heard Carey's voice interrupt.

The other's changed to a whine.

"Aw, be sensible, Carey! You're soused now, or you wouldn't be such a fool. Why not slip me a li'l jack and let it go at that? You don't want the bulls comin' in on this."

Clancy stared at Sophie. The wife walked to the door.

"Don!" she called. "Who's down-stairs?"

"You 'tend to your own affairs," came her husband's answer. "Shut your door, and your mouth, too."

Mrs. Carey seemed to stagger under the retort. She sat down again. She turned to Clancy, licking her lips with her tongue.

"Please--please----" she gasped, "see--who it is--with Don."

Down-stairs Clancy tiptoed. Voices were raised again in altercation.

"Why the deuce _should_ I give you money?" demanded Carey. "Suppose I did run a fake agency for the pictures? Suppose I did promise a few girls jobs that they never got? What about it? You can't dig any of those girls up. Run tell the police."

"Yes; that's all right," said the other voice. "But suppose that I tell 'em that you had a key to Morris Beiner's office, hey? Suppose I tell 'em that, hey?"

Something seemed to rise from Clancy's chest right up through her throat and into her mouth. Once again on tiptoe, wanting to scream, yet determined to keep silent, she edged her way to the dining-room door. Don Carey had made no answer to this last speech of his visitor. Peering through the door, Clancy knew why. He was lying back in a chair, his mouth wide open, his eyes equally wide with fright. And the man at whom he stared was the man who had been with Spofford yesterday, the elevator-man from the Heberworth Building!

XXVI

Hand pressed against her bosom, Clancy stared into the dining-room. She could not breathe as she waited for Carey's reply to his visitor's charge. So Don Carey had possessed a key to the office of Morris Beiner! The theatrical man had been locked in his office when Clancy had made her escape from the room by way of the window. The door had not been forced. And Don Carey had possessed a key!

For a moment, she thought, with pity, of the woman up-stairs, the woman who had befriended her, whose life had been shadowed by her husband. But only for a moment. She herself was wanted for this murder; her eyes were hard as she stared into the room.

Carey's fingers reached out aimlessly. They fastened finally upon a half-drained glass.

"Who's going to believe that kind of yarn?" he demanded.

"I can prove it all right," said the other.

"Well, even if you can prove it, what then?"

His visitor shrugged.

"You seemed worried about it a minute ago," he said. "Oh, there ain't no use tryin' to kid me, I know what I know. It all depends on you who I tell it to. I ain't a mean guy." His voice became whining. "I ain't a trouble-maker. I can keep my trap closed as well as any one. When," he added significantly, "there's enough in it for me."

"And you think you can blackmail me?" demanded Carey. His attempt at righteous indignation sounded rather flat. The elevator-man lost his whine; his voice became sulkily hard.

"Sticks and stones won't break no bones," he said. "Call it what you please. I don't care--so long as I get mine."

Carey dropped his pretense of indignation.

"Well, there's no need of you shouting," he said. He rose to his feet, assisting himself with a hand on the edge of the table.