The Abandoned Room Part 12

"In my room. Shall I fetch it, sir?"

Graham nodded, and Jenkins shuffled up the stairs.

"What luck!" Graham said. "Howells must have telephoned his suspicions to the district attorney. He must have mentioned the evidence, but what does that amount to since it's disappeared along with the duplicate of the report, if Howells made one?"

"I can fight with a clear conscience," Bobby cried. "I wasn't asleep when Howells's body altered its position. Do you realize what that means to me? For once I was wide awake when the old room was at its tricks."

"If Howells were alive," Graham answered shortly, "he would look on the fact that you were awake and alone with the body as the worst possible evidence against you."

Bobby's elation died.

"There is always something to tangle me in the eyes of the law with these mysteries. But I know, and I'll fight. Can you find any trace of a conspiracy against me in this last ghastly adventure?"

"It complicates everything," Graham admitted.

"It's beyond sounding," Bobby said, "for my grandfather's death last night and the disturbance of his body this afternoon seemed calculated to condemn me absolutely, yet Howells's murder and the movement of his body, with the disappearance of the cast and the handkerchief, seem designed to save me. Are there two influences at work in this house--one for me, one against me?"

"Let's think of the human elements," Graham answered with a frown. "I have no faith in Paredes. My man has failed to report on Maria. That's queer. You fancy a woman in black slipping through the woods, and we hear a woman cry. I want to account for those things before I give in to Groom's spirits. I confess at times they seem the only logical explanation. Here's Jenkins."

"If trouble comes of his withholding the report I'll take the blame," Bobby said.

Graham s.n.a.t.c.hed the long envelope from Jenkins' hand. It was addressed in a firm hand to the district attorney at the county seat.

"There's no question," Graham said. "That's it. We mustn't open it. We'd better not destroy it. Put it where it won't be easily found, Jenkins. If you are questioned you have no recollection of Howells having given it to you. Mr. Blackburn promises he will see you get in no trouble."

The old man smiled.

"Trouble!" he scoffed. "Mr. Blackburn needn't fret himself about me. He's the last of this family--that is Miss Katherine and he. I'm old and about done for. I don't mind trouble. Not a bit, sir."

Bobby pressed his hand. His voice was a little husky: "I didn't think you'd go that far in my service, Jenkins."

The old butler smiled slyly: "I'd go a lot further than that, sir."

"We'd better get back," Graham said. "The blood hounds ought to be here, and they'll sniff at the case harder than ever because it's done for Howells."

They watched Jenkins go upstairs with the report.

"We're taking long chances," Graham said, "desperately long chances, but you're in a desperately dangerous position. It's the only way. You'll be accused of stealing the evidence; but remember, when they question you, they can prove nothing unless the cast and the handkerchief turn up. If they've been taken by an enemy in some magical fashion to be produced at the proper moment, there's no hope. Meantime play the game, and Katherine and I will help you all we can. The doctor, too, is friendly. There's no doubt of him. Come, now. Let's face the music."

Bobby followed Graham to the hall, trying to strengthen his nerves for the ordeal. Even now he was more appalled by the apparently supernatural background of the case than he was by the material details which pointed to his guilt. More than the report and the cast and the handkerchief, the remembrance of that impossible moment in the blackness of the old room filled his mind, and the unearthly and remote crying still throbbed in his ears.

Katherine, Graham, and the doctor waited by the fireplace. They had heard nothing from the authorities.

"But they must be here soon," Doctor Groom said.

"Did you learn anything back there, Hartley?" Katherine asked.

"It wasn't the servants," he said. "Jenkins heard the crying. He's certain it came from outside the house."

Paredes looked up.

"Extraordinary!" he said.

"I wish I had heard it," Doctor Groom grumbled.

Paredes laughed.

"Thank the good Lord I didn't. Perpetually, Bobby, your house reminds me that I've nerves sensitive to the unknown world. I will go further than the doctor. I will say that this house is crowded with the supernatural. It shelters things that we cannot understand, that we will never understand. When I was a child in Panama I had a nurse who, unfortunately, developed too strongly my native superst.i.tion. How she frightened me with her bedtime stories! They were all of men murdered or dead of fevers, crossing the trail, or building the railroad, or digging insufficient ditches for De Lesseps. Some of her best went farther back than that. They were thick with the ghosts of old Spaniards and the crimson hands of Morgan's buccaneers. Really that tiny strip across the isthmus is crowded with souls s.n.a.t.c.hed too quickly from torn and tortured bodies. If you are sensitive you feel they are still there."

"What has all this to do with the Cedars?" Doctor Groom grumbled.

"It explains my ability to sense strange elements in this old house. There are in Panama--if you don't mind, doctor--improvised graveyards, tangled by the jungle, that give you a feeling of an active, unseen population precisely as this house does."

He arose and strolled with a cat-like lack of sound about the hall. When he spoke again his voice was scarcely audible. It was the voice of a man who thinks aloud, and the doctor failed to interrupt him again.

"I have felt less spiritually alarmed in those places of grinning skulls, which always seem trying to recite agonies beyond expression, than I feel in this house. For here the woods are more desolate than the jungle, and the walls of houses as old as this make a prison for suffering."

A vague discomfort stole through Bobby's surprise. He had never heard Paredes speak so seriously. In spite of the man's unruffled manner there was nothing of mockery about his words. What, then, was their intention?

Paredes said no more, but for several minutes he paced up and down the hall, glancing often with languid eyes toward the stairs. He had the appearance of one who expects and waits.

Katherine, Graham, and the doctor, Bobby could see, had been made as uneasy as himself by the change in the Panamanian. The doctor cleared his throat. His voice broke the silence tentatively: "If this house makes you so unhappy, young man, why do you stay?"

Paredes paused in his walk. His thin lips twitched. He indicated Bobby.

"For the sake of my very good friend. What are a man's personal fears and desires if he can help his friends?"

Graham's distaste was evident. Paredes recognized it with a smile. Bobby watched him curiously, realizing more and more that Graham was right to this extent: they must somehow learn the real purpose of the Panamanian's continued presence here.

Paredes resumed his walk. He still had that air of expectancy. He seemed to listen. This feeling of imminence reached Bobby; increased his restlessness. He thought he heard an automobile horn outside. He sprang up, went to the door, opened it, and stood gazing through the damp and narrow court. Yet, he confessed, he listened for a repet.i.tion of that unearthly crying through the thicket rather than for the approach of those who would try to condemn him for two murders. Paredes was right. The place was unhealthy. Its dark walls seemed to draw closer. They had a desolate and unfriendly secretiveness. They might hide anything.

The whirring of a motor reached him. Headlights flung gigantic, distorted shadows of trees across the walls of the old wing. Bobby faced the others.

"They're coming," he said, and his voice was sufficiently apprehensive now.

Graham joined him at the door. "Yes," he said. "There will be another inquisition. You all know that Howells for some absurd reason suspected Bobby. Bobby, it goes without saying, knows no more about the crimes than any of us. I dare say you'll keep that in mind if they try to confuse you. After all, there's very little any of us can tell them."

"Except," Paredes said with a yawn, "what went on upstairs when the woman cried and Howells's body moved. Of course I know nothing about that."

Graham glanced at him sharply.

"I don't know what you mean, but you have told us all that you are Bobby's friend."

"Quite so. And I am not a spy."

He moved his head in his grave and dignified bow.

The automobile stopped at the entrance to the court. Three men stepped out and hurried up the path. As they entered the hall Bobby recognized the sallow, wizened features of the coroner. One of the others was short and thick set. His round and florid face, one felt, should have expressed friendliness and good-humour rather than the intolerant anger that marked it now. The third was a lank, bald-headed man, whose sharp face released more determination than intelligence.

"I am Robinson, the district attorney," the stout one announced, "and this is Jack Rawlins, the best detective I've got now that Howells is gone. Jack was a close friend of Howells, so he'll make a good job of it, but I thought it was time I came myself to see what the devil's going on in this house."

The lank man nodded.

"You're right, Mr. Robinson. There'll be no more nonsense about the case. If Howells had made an arrest he might be alive this minute."

Bobby's heart sank. These men would act from a primary instinct of revenge. They wanted the man who had killed Silas Blackburn princ.i.p.ally because it was certain he had also killed their friend. Rawlins's words, moreover, suggested that Howells must have telephoned a pretty clear outline of the case. Robinson stared at them insolently.

"This is Doctor Groom, I know. Which is young Mr. Blackburn?"

Bobby stepped forward. The sharp eyes, surrounded by puffy flesh, studied him aggressively. Bobby forced himself to meet that unfriendly gaze. Would Robinson accuse him now, before he had gone into the case for himself? At least he could prove nothing. After a moment the man turned away.

"Who is this?" he asked, indicating Graham.

"A very good friend--my lawyer, Mr. Graham," Bobby answered.

Robinson walked over to Paredes.

"Another lawyer?" he sneered.

"Another friend," Paredes answered easily.

Robinson glanced at Katherine.

"Of course you are Miss Perrine. Good. Coroner, these are all that were in the front part of the house when you were here before?"

"The same lot," the coroner squeaked.

"There are three servants, a man and two women," Robinson went on. "Account for them, Rawlins, and see what they have to say. Come upstairs when you're through. All right, Coroner."

But he paused at the foot of the steps.

"For the present no one will leave the house without my permission. If you care to come upstairs with me, Mr. Blackburn, you might be useful."

Bobby shrank from the thought of returning to the old room even with this determined company. He didn't hesitate, however, for Robinson's purpose was clear. He wanted Bobby where he could watch him. Graham prepared to accompany them.

"If you need me," the doctor said. "I looked at the body--"

"Oh, yes," Robinson sneered. "I'd like to know exactly what time you found the body."

Graham flushed, but Katherine answered easily: "About half-past two--the hour at which Mr. Blackburn was killed."

"And I," Robinson sneered, "was aroused at three-thirty. An hour during which the police were left out of the case!"

"We thought it wise to get a physician first of all," Graham said.

"You knew Howells never had a chance. You knew he had been murdered the moment you looked at him," Robinson burst out.

"We acted for the best," Graham answered.

His manner impressed silence on Katherine and Bobby.

"We'll see about that later," Robinson said with a clear threat. "If it doesn't inconvenience you too much we'll go up now."

In the upper hall he s.n.a.t.c.hed the candle from the table.

"Which way?"

Katherine nodded to the old corridor and slipped to her room. Robinson stepped forward with the coroner at his heels. Bobby, Graham, and the doctor followed. Inside the narrow, choking pa.s.sage Bobby saw the district attorney hesitate.

"What's the matter?" the doctor rumbled.

The district attorney went on without answering. He glanced at the broken lock.

"So you had to smash your way in?"

He walked to the bed and looked down at Howells.

"Poor devil!" he murmured. "Howells wasn't the man to get caught unawares. It's beyond me how any one could have come close enough to make that wound without putting him on his guard."

"It's beyond us, as it was beyond him," Graham answered, "how any one got into the room at all."

In response to Robinson's questions he told in detail about the discovery of both murders. Robinson pondered for some time.

"Then you and Mr. Blackburn were asleep," he said. "Miss Perrine aroused you. This foreigner Paredes was awake and dressed and in the lower hall."

"I think he was in the court as we went by the stair-well," Graham corrected him.

"I shall want to talk to your foreigner," Robinson said. He shivered. "This room is like a charnel house. Why did Howells want to sleep here?"

"I don't think he intended to sleep," Graham said. "From the start Howells was bound to solve the mystery of the entrance of the room. He came here, hoping that the criminal would make just such an attempt as he did. He was confident he could take care of himself, get his man, and clear up the last details of the case."

Robinson looked straight at Bobby.

"Then Howells knew the criminal was in the house."

"Howells, I daresay," Graham said, "telephoned you something of his suspicions." Robinson nodded.

"He was on the wrong line," Graham argued, "or he wouldn't have been so easily overcome. You can see for yourself. Locked doors, a wound that suggests the a.s.sailant was close to him, yet he must have been awake and watchful; and if there had been a physical attack before the sharp instrument was driven into his brain he would have cried out, yet Miss Perrine was aroused by nothing of the sort, and the coroner, I daresay, will find no marks of a struggle about the body."

The coroner who had been busy at the bed glanced up.

"No mark at all. If Howells wasn't asleep, his murderer must have been invisible as well as noiseless."

Doctor Groom smiled. The coroner glared at him.

"I suggest, Mr. District Attorney," he squeaked, "that the ordinary layman wouldn't know that this type of wound would cause immediate death."

"Nor would any man," the doctor answered angrily, "be able to make such a wound with his victim lying on his back."