Part 14

"About this Lathrop case," introduced Kennedy. "You know that she was very intimate with Mr. Shattuck."

Chase nodded.

"It occurred to me," went on Kennedy, "that since you were working for Mrs. Wilford you might be able to help me. There were several things you told me the other day that I've been thinking about."

Chase narrowed his eyes as if trying to fathom what Kennedy was thinking. "I admit breaking into Shattuck's apartment," he said. "Do you mean that?"

"Partly. Why did you do it?"

"It was to get some letters Mrs. Lathrop had written to him," returned Chase, without quizzing.

"Did you get them?"

"I did."

"Where are they?"

Chase balked.

"Did you read them?"

"Yes," he answered, reluctantly.

"What was in them? Shattuck had been pursuing Mrs. Lathrop, hadn't he?" fenced Kennedy, keenly.

"No--he had not. She had been pursuing him," snapped Chase, though why he was so evidently put out about it I could not make out at first.

"How about that Calabar bean?"

"I found it in a cabinet, while I was searching for the letters," he answered, his face betraying no expression.

"Why did you tell me that in the first place?" demanded Kennedy, suddenly switching the subject. "Did you have any motive?"

"Motive? I thought you ought to know--that's all. He's not _my_ client, you know."

"But he's a _friend_ of your client and--"

"Say, Kennedy, I know how Doyle has been hounding that poor little woman. If you want the truth, I didn't tell Doyle because it wouldn't do any good. I thought you could be _fair_."

"Well, what's your opinion?"

"I haven't any opinion. I know what I found. It's for you to have an opinion. Besides, I won't sacrifice a client for a friend of the client. Get me?" he asked, pointedly.

"She has won you, hasn't she?" asked Kennedy, somewhat, I thought, in Doyle's style.

Chase looked at him a minute. "Say, Kennedy," he returned, "I've always regarded you as something more than the rest of us."

He stopped as though he would have said more, but considered he had said enough.

What he meant by his cryptic remarks I could not make out. Was he determined to save his client, even at the cost of her lover? Kennedy's face was inscrutable. If he knew what Chase meant, I am sure Chase read no answer.

We left immediately afterward and soon were back again in the Subway. As we waited for the train, Kennedy paced the platform.

"I think I'm right, Walter," he remarked. "The thing is to prove it. I'm going to use a little more of Freud--to apply him to some detective work--in other words, I'm going to play upon suppressed desires. Just watch how it works."

Somewhat less than half an hour later we found ourselves in the hurly-burly of the Wall Street district. Shattuck, I knew, had an office around the corner not very far from that which Vail Wilford had occupied.

Kennedy, who had been there before, easily located it and called the floor from memory.

"It's not a large office," I remarked, as I followed Craig down the hall and stopped before a single glass door that bore Shattuck's name, adding, "Banker & Broker."

"But probably it's large enough for all the brokerage business that Shattuck really does," he returned. "I have an idea that it is just about enough to keep him from being classed as an idler. Besides, it gives him standing."

Kennedy handed his card to the boy who presided over a sort of swinging gate in the outer office.

The door to Shattuck's inner office happened to be open and we could see him. Consequently it was not possible for him to send out word that he was not in.

It was a rather nettled office-boy who returned to us.

"For what, may I ask, am I indebted to you for _this_ visit?" inquired Shattuck with almost insulting bruskness as the boy stood at the door, admitting us, then carefully closed the door to the outer office.

I felt angry at the tone, but Kennedy kept his temper admirably.

"I suppose," began Craig, clearing his throat and speaking as deliberately as ever Shattuck did, "that you know the story about Mrs. Lathrop?"

"Some one on the street called my attention to it," Shattuck prevaricated, rather than admit interest.

"I thought you might be in a position to explain it--at least to throw some light on it," pursued Kennedy, directly. "I'm quite interested, naturally."

"Explain it?" flared Shattuck, eagerly seizing on something that would divert the main issue. "Explain it? Why, you and Doyle and the newspapers"--nodding insultingly at me--"ought to be able to do that best, don't you think? It's you all that have caused a great deal of trouble. Judging by what I read and hear, you know more about our affairs in this case than we do ourselves. I'd suggest that perhaps our positions should be reversed. I might appeal to you for information, rather than have you coming around here appealing to me."

Not only was it what he said, but it was even more the tone and manner in which he said it that seemed to rub Kennedy the wrong way. As for myself, I must confess that I was boiling over at the bravado of the man.

I would have come back with a quick remark--and probably have exposed my hand and done exactly what Shattuck expected, for there was no denying that he was clever with a gambler's cleverness and nerve.

It was not so with Kennedy. For a moment he paused, as though checking a first remark; then he spoke in the same measured and considered tones as at the start.

"I can tell you, Shattuck, that I don't like the attitude either you or Mrs. Wilford assume."

Shattuck merely shrugged superciliously, and would have turned to some papers on his desk, had not Kennedy possessed one of those compelling personalities that demand that you hear them out, whether you like it or not.

"Mrs. Wilford seems to have assumed a sort of passive attitude toward me," Kennedy resumed.

"You don't expect her to help you?" inquired Shattuck.

"As for yourself," continued Craig, unperturbed, "I am frankly of the opinion, Shattuck, that your attitude is quite one of open hostility. I would not presume to dictate to either of you how you should order your conduct--but--it seems to me that, under the circumstances, it might not be unwise to take care not to prejudice your cases, you know."

Shattuck involuntarily shot a quick glance from under his heavy eyebrows at Kennedy. But not even Shattuck's cleverness could read anything in Craig's face.

What is it that this man knows? Quite apparently that was the sudden thought working back of Shattuck's beetling brows.

"For instance," continued Kennedy, as though determined to have his way in the matter and ram the words down Shattuck's throat, "I am sure you know of that Calabar bean which I--or rather Mr. Jameson--discovered in Mr. Wilford's office--not very far away from here, I see."

Shattuck's face was a study. Not once did the man lose his poise. It was not that.

"Well, it raises some interesting problems. I won't say that I haven't settled them. But, for the sake of argument, let us take the circumstance--just in itself."

Shattuck calmly lighted a cigarette and deliberately inhaled it, bored.

"Of course," Craig went on, after a pause, "we all know that Doctor Lathrop is a doctor and hence likely to dabble in almost anything relating to his profession. Perhaps he knew of the existence and the properties of the Calabar bean. Quite certainly, I should say. No doubt he has used the drug--physostigmine. In fact, he tells me he has. Very well, then. So much for that.

"Take yourself, for example. I think I recall seeing many African trophies in that very cozy den of yours. Now, the Calabar bean is well known in Africa, not only in the Calabar, on the west coast, but in many other parts of the continent that travelers and tourists visit. So, you see, although at first sight such a bean might seem to have very little to do with a prosperous broker on Broad Street, it is not impossible that a judge or jury--or a detective--might see a connection."

Kennedy paused to watch the effect of the home thrust. I cannot say that Shattuck even winced. He was a man with too much control over himself for that. I longed for some of the psychological laboratory instruments that will reveal, often, what a nerve-strong exterior hides.

"But, quite more important still," continued Kennedy, "is the fact that the bean, or rather its derivative, physostigmine--which we know was the poison that killed Wilford--is known and used by oculists for its curious effect on the pupils. Now, from what I have learned on unimpeachable authority about Mrs. Wilford as a girl, her father, Honore Chappelle, a Frenchman, was a well-known oculist. He had no sons and often used to wish that his only child had not been a girl. For a time he had some vague idea, I believe, that his daughter might take up his place in the business. However, that was merely fanciful. As Honora grew to womanhood and tasted the advantages of the not small fortune her father had piled up, the social life appealed to her. And yet, in the girlhood days, who shall say she did not learn something of the Calabar bean, of the drug, and of its properties? It would be most unlikely if she did not."

Kennedy paused for a moment, leaving Shattuck almost speechless and hiding a secret fear.

"You can draw your own conclusions from what I have just said," finished Craig. "Sometimes, you know, actions speak louder than words."

Shattuck had risen, almost angrily as two red spots of passion appeared on his face over the cheek-bones.

"Don't you think you have done enough, hounding Mrs. Wilford with your confounded science?" he demanded.

"I cannot say," replied Kennedy, coolly, reaching for his hat and deliberately turning away. "I am telling you this only for your own benefit. Good morning, sir."

Just what Kennedy was attempting I began to understand as we closed the door to the hall and turned again to the elevator. The seeking out of Shattuck was quite in keeping with the plan of campaign Craig had mapped out at the start.

I saw that he was counting on planting something that would make Shattuck fear for Honora, if not for himself. And, it was evident that behind his bravado Shattuck did have a fear for Honora.

XVII

THE SUPPRESSED DESIRE

Even before Kennedy announced where he was going, I outguessed the next step in his scheme.

He would end by planting something that would make Honora fearful for Shattuck, as well as for herself. The effect would be to bring to light her suppressed desires, to make the Freudian theory play detective for us. And then? Almost anything might happen.

Looked at in this light, I could see that Craig would have done a very profitable day's work. It was, in short, merely playing one against the other--first Lathrop against Vina; now Honora against Shattuck.

We rode back again up-town and prepared to make our daily excuse for visiting Mrs. Wilford. In spite of the distastefulness of our duty, I felt sure that still our position with her was superior to that of the other inquisitors who were always on her trail.

"Before we go in," cautioned Kennedy, as we entered the main entrance to the apartment, "I want to see McCabe. He must be back on the job by this time."

Careful to cover ourselves, we sought out the ostensibly empty apartment which Doyle had hired as a dictagraph room. McCabe was there and seemed to be glad to see us. Evidently he had some news to report.

"What's on your mind, McCabe?" greeted Kennedy.

"Why, sir, he's been calling her up again."

"Who?"

"Mr. Shattuck, I mean."

Kennedy merely glanced at me. The virus had begun to work.

"What did he say?" asked Kennedy, quickly.

"I couldn't just make out what it was about. He wasn't very definite. Said he wanted to see her alone."

"And Mrs. Wilford?"

"Said she couldn't--that she was afraid--afraid for him, she said. I guess she knows pretty well how we're watching her."

"What did Shattuck say to that?"

"Well, I should say he was trying to warn _her_," replied McCabe, "without coming out too definitely. You see, they were both pretty careful in the words they used. There's something strange between that pair, you can be sure of that."

"What were the exact words?" asked Kennedy. "Did you get them down?"

McCabe nodded and referred to his notes.

"When Mr. Shattuck called up, he asked her first, 'I suppose they're watching you yet, Honora?'

"'Oh, Vance,' she answered, 'it gets worse every day.'

"There's some more--and then he suddenly said, 'Honora, Kennedy has just been here to see me again.'

"She seemed to be rather alarmed at that news. 'To see you again, Vance? What about?'

"'I don't know what he's up to,' Shattuck replied. 'I wish I did. It's something about that poisoned bean--you know, the thing they've been talking about.'"

"Pretending ignorance!" I exclaimed. "He knows. Go on."

"They talked about that a little while, without saying anything important. The next was Honora: 'He keeps asking me all sorts of questions about dreams and trying psychological experiments. I don't dare refuse to answer. But what do you suppose it is all about, Vance?'"

"What did Shattuck tell her?" asked Kennedy, interested.

"Here, I'll read it, exactly. 'More of that Freud stuff, I guess, Honora, from what you've already told me. That may go all very well in a book--or in Greenwich Village. But it's a fake, I tell you. Don't believe it--too much.'"

"That's a remarkably reassuring statement," commented Kennedy. "Don't believe it--and then he takes it all back by adding, 'too much.'"

"Yes, sir," agreed McCabe, to whom this angle of the case was a mystery. "I don't know as he believed what he said himself. You see, he next asked her: 'Can't you see me? I _must_ try to help you.' And he meant it, too."

"Did she say she would?" hastened Kennedy.

"Not directly. 'Vance, I'm so afraid--afraid to drag you into this thing. You know they're watching me so closely. I don't see them around--yet they seem to know so much.'"

"You don't suppose she suspects anything of this?" I interrupted, indicating the dictagraph and the tapped telephone.

"Hardly," answered McCabe. "She wouldn't talk at all over the wire, if she did, would she? Here's how it ended. Shattuck said, finally, 'Well, I'm going to see you very soon, anyhow, to have a heart-to-heart talk, Honora.' He seemed to be quite worried. And so did she over him."

"Have you told Doyle anything about it?" asked Craig.

"Haven't had a chance yet. It just happened."

Kennedy turned to go.

"Oh, just before that that detective called her up, too."

"Which one--Rascon or Chase?"

"Chase."

Kennedy smiled quietly. Everything was working.

"What of him?"

"He said you had been to see him. There was something about that poisonous bean he told her."

"Did he mention Shattuck's name?" asked Kennedy.

"Yes, he questioned her about Shattuck--about his travels--I thought it was pretty broadly hinting after he mentioned that Calabar bean."

"But did he say anything definite about it? I mean, anything connecting it with Shattuck?"

"No--nothing definite."

Evidently Chase had never told Honora of his discovery in Shattuck's apartments. Why? Was it because he was sure that she would not believe it? Was he waiting for more conclusive evidence? What was the reason? It had not been revealed even yet.

We thanked McCabe, made our exit, and arrived on Honora's floor in such a way that it would not be suspected that we had been anywhere else in the building.

As we met Mrs. Wilford, I cannot say that we were quite as welcome as on some previous encounters with her. It seemed that she was repressing her excitement not quite as easily as on previous occasions.

Yet she seemed not to dare to refuse to see us. Perhaps, too, there was an element of curiosity to know whether anything had been discovered beyond what Doyle had already told her.

If that were the case, she had not long to wait. Kennedy did not plan this time to keep her in suspense long.

In fact, it seemed as if it were part of his plan to fire the information he wished to impart as a broadside and watch the effect, both immediate and ultimate.

"I suppose you have read in the newspapers about the troubles of the Lathrops and what has happened?" he opened fire.

"Nothing about that woman interests me," Honora returned, coldly.

"That's not exactly what I came to tell you, though," remarked Kennedy, briskly.

Honora was on the alert in an instant, although she tried to hide it.

"I've discovered just what it was that caused the death of your husband," hastened Craig.

I watched her closely. She was trying to show just enough and not too much interest.

"Indeed?" she replied, veiling her eyes as a matter of self-defense. "Was it belladonna?"

"No, it was not atropin," returned Craig, giving the drug its more scientific name. "It was physostigmine."

I was watching her narrowly. Evidently she had been expecting some repetition of the psychological tests and Kennedy's more direct attack almost swept away a defense as she tried to adjust herself to the unexpected.

Before she could recover from the shock that the bald statement seemed to give her, Craig shot out, "Has Doyle told you?"

"Yes," she replied, endeavoring to remain calm and at the same time appear frank, "something about a bean which either you or Mr. Jameson discovered down in the office."

"Then why did you mention belladonna?" asked Craig.

She avoided his gaze as she answered, quickly, "Because it was the first thing that the police mentioned--the first thing that came into my head--like some of your psychological tests, I suppose."

The last sentence was uttered with a sort of sarcastic defiance which I did not relish in Honora.

"So," she continued in the same defiant tone, "it's another poison, this time--this physostigmine?"

"Yes," reiterated Kennedy, quietly. "The Calabar bean. I suppose Doyle described it to you--its devilish uses in the Calabar--the way the natives use it in ordeals--and all that sort of thing?"

"Yes--briefly," she replied, evidently steeling herself into a nonchalance she did not feel.

"Of course, the drug has a certain medical importance, too," continued Craig, as though eager to hammer home the information about it which he wished to have stick in her mind. "It is physostigmine."

Honora was evidently about to ask some question about the drug, perhaps such a question as would have portrayed ignorance, but Kennedy caught her eye and she closed her parted lips. There was no use camouflaging before this man. She knew it--knew the drug, I decided, and knew he knew she knew of it.

"But it wasn't the drug, physostigmine, in this case," went on Kennedy. "It was the Calabar bean itself. I found traces of it in Mr. Wilford's stomach--starch grains from the beans themselves. You know you can recognize various starch grains under the microscope by their size, formation, and so forth. I've clearly demonstrated that."

"You did? Why--I--I--er--thought that was Doctor Leslie's work."

Evidently she did not realize that Kennedy was anything more than a dilettante scientist, dabbling with his psychological tests.

Kennedy was now coming into the open more and more with her and she could not place him. On her part she saw that she must be more and more on guard, yet with fewer weapons on which to rely.

"Oh no," returned Kennedy, easily. "I mix up in all sorts of queer investigations. Toxicology is a hobby with me. Doctor Leslie did indeed confirm my results, working independently."

He paused to let her get the full significance.

"But about these beans. They come from Africa, you know. Travelers, people who have hunted over Africa, often bring them back as curios."

Honora shot a covert glance at Craig. Did she know that Shattuck had possessed some, after all?

I saw at once the trend of Kennedy's remarks. There was quite enough in what he had said to arouse in her the fear that Shattuck was suspected by him.

And, as I studied Honora even more closely, I could see now that she was making a great effort to conceal her anxiety.

If the anxiety concerned solely herself, I could have understood it better, perhaps.

But was it about herself? Would she have acted in just this manner if it had been that she believed Kennedy to be making a direct accusation against her?

I could not decide. But, as I thought of it, I saw how cleverly Kennedy was leading his trumps.

If she were consumed with anxiety for Shattuck, the traveler in Africa, she must be heroically suppressing her own real feelings toward him, as she had done for so long.

I felt sure that the added pressure, day by day, was having its effect on her.

"I suppose you know," pursued Kennedy, deliberately, without letting up on the pressure, "that traces of belladonna were found in one glass on Mr. Wilford's desk at the office and that an almost empty bottle of belladonna was found by the police here in your apartment?"

"It was mine," she asserted, calmly, as though prepared. "It had been nearly used up. Celeste knows all about how I used it for my eyes. Many women do. She can tell you that."

She said it boldly, and yet, since Kennedy had mentioned the Calabar bean, I had an indefinable feeling that Honora was concealing something--perhaps not only a fact--but also a great fear.

No longer, now, did Kennedy seem to care whether he antagonized her or not. More and more, it seemed, it was his purpose to drop the mask with her, to fight her with other weapons than those psychological.

"Both physostigmine and belladonna are used by oculists, you know," hinted Kennedy, broadly.

The face of Honora was a study as she listened to this direct insinuation. She bit her lips at the thought that she had betrayed her knowledge of the use of belladonna.

For an instant Honora gazed at Kennedy, startled at the penetrating power of his eyes, as she realized that the finding of the bean had, in his mind, perhaps, some connection with herself.

What must have been the conflicting emotions in her mind as, now, for the first time, she realized that Kennedy had gone deeper into the case than Doyle or Leslie, that, while she might be a match for them, she could not possibly hope to be a match against the new weapons of science that Kennedy had brought to bear? Even though she might not fully appreciate them, Honora was too clever a woman not to know, merely by intuition, that she was faced with a battle in which the old weapons were unavailing.

I know the thoughts that were surging, by Kennedy's suggestion, through her mind--the past of her life, her father, Honore Chappelle; the old love-affair with Shattuck; the attainment of social ambitions with Wilford--and back again to the life of her girlhood and the profession of her father.

I thought for the moment that Craig had broken through her reserve. I knew that Kennedy was in reality fishing--at least I thought so. But it was evident by her actions that Honora did not know it.

"Why do you make these--these accusations?" she demanded. "You knew that my father was an optician--one of the best known in the city," she cried, searching Craig's face.

Kennedy nodded implacably.

"I haven't made any accusations," he returned, then added, directly, "But I assumed that you knew something of his business while he was alive."

"I do not know by what right you assume that I knew anything of the sort," she fenced. "Girls were not supposed to learn trades or professions in those days."

Honora, in spite of her assumption of a quiet tone, was almost hysterical. The mounting flush on her face showed that she was keen with emotion, that it was only by an almost superhuman effort that she controlled the volcano of her feelings.

Kennedy could see that it was only by such an effort that she managed to maintain her composure. He must have known that to press the case would have resulted in a situation such as might have advanced us fairly far toward the truth. Yet he did not follow farther any advantage he might have.