The Rest Hollow Mystery Part 20

"Yes, but that idea did not occur to me until the end of the interview.

Being a complete stranger in the community, I knew nothing about him, of course, but his voice and method of appeal struck me as being a little abnormal, and when I was starting away and he stretched a letter through the gate and asked me to mail it for him I was convinced that he was not rational. I was formerly a director at one our State hospitals for the insane and I know that the mania of patients to write letters and ask visitors to mail them is one of the commonest symptoms of their affliction."

"And so you paid no attention to that appeal?"

"I was escorting a lady. I planned to take her home first and then return or send somebody. My car was disabled and I felt responsible for my companion."

"Who was the lady?"

"My sister, Mrs. Paddington. I was visiting at her home. And when we had gone on our way she told me, what I had already begun to suspect, that the inmate of Rest Hollow was a mental invalid; that he was well cared for, and although the case was pathetic, we need feel under no obligation to return. His attendant, we reasoned, had already discovered him by that time and taken him back to the house. We had both dismissed him from our minds when about half an hour later a woman rushed up to our door, breathless from a long trip by foot, and told us that the inmate of Rest Hollow had killed himself; that she had found him lying dead under the dining-room window. I don't remember just who 'phoned the news in to the proper authorities, but I think it was she. My sister offered to send her into town in one of her cars, and did so. We never knew her name nor saw her again."

"And you credited the woman's story as it stood?"

"We saw no reason to doubt it. It fitted exactly with our encounter at the gate. The time was a coincidence, too. We a.s.sumed that the young man's attendant had not arrived in time to save him from suicide. And there was another reason, too, why we did not care to give the matter more intensive investigation." He stopped and glanced appealingly at his questioner, but there was no relenting in the lawyer's eyes. "My sister had a guest visiting her to whom the name of Roger Kenwick brought--unhappy a.s.sociations. She was unfortunately present at the arrival of the woman from Rest Hollow, and after the shock of the announcement was over we carefully avoided all further discussion of the tragedy. The following morning, in courtesy to our guest, I went over to the Raeburn house with some flowers from the Utopia gardens, and verified the report that the patient was dead. The next day my sister's friend left for her home in San Francisco and we considered the affair a closed incident."

The testimony of the other witnesses for the prosecution was given in due order, and the case summed up against Roger Kenwick charged him with having laid a deliberate plot to murder Marstan, his former keeper, he being the only man, he thought, who could interfere with his financial plans, and prevent him from playing upon his brother's chivalric affection.

It was pointed out that only a month before his recovery the Kenwick estate had trebled its value, owing to the fact that leather goods, which were the source of the Kenwick income, had trebled in value since the beginning of the war. From newspaper accounts and discussions with Marstan himself, the recovered patient had shrewdly sized up the situation and laid his plans. It was previously stated that the elder Kenwick had, before his brother's misfortune, kept a jealous grip upon the family purse, and that during his college days at the State University, Roger Kenwick had been obliged to eke out his allowance by doing newspaper work on one of the San Francisco dailies. Only in his softened mood was Everett Kenwick to be counted upon for continued generosity.

On the day of the tragedy, the ward had watched Marstan closely and had seen him depart for town. Earlier in the afternoon he had himself shown signs of violence in order to sustain the impression that he was still irresponsible. Kenwick's plan to kill his warden was perfectly safe, for he knew that if the crime ever came to light he could be cleared on an insanity charge. His worse punishment would be commitment to an inst.i.tution, from which he could later be released by proving himself cured.

On the way out from town the doctor's car had pitched over a cliff, killing him instantly. Kenwick, ignorant of the tragedy and lying in wait for his victim, saw a man steal in late at night through the side entrance. No callers ever came to the place, so having no doubt that it was the returning warden, he had crept up behind him in the darkness and shot him in the head with the revolver which his attendant always kept loaded for an emergency, and which the patient by spying upon his warden one night, had discovered.

A few minutes previous to the murder he had played a skilful part at the front gate, holding up the first person who pa.s.sed and telling an incoherent story which he knew, coming from him, would not be believed, and which would be of valuable a.s.sistance in case it were ever necessary to prove an insanity charge.

When he discovered that he had killed the wrong man, he adopted a plan which proved him not only rational but unusually astute. From a previous conversation with the dead man, whom he now recognized as a fellow who had once come in to a.s.sist with some work on the car, he knew him to be a stranger in the community. He knew himself to be equally unknown, except by name, and it was an easy matter to exchange ident.i.ties. So Kenwick had transferred to the dead man certain of his own personal possessions which he discovered after his mental recovery.

He had selected these carefully and with diabolical cunning, placed them in the other man's pockets, and then made his escape from the place either by foot or in the wagon of the undertaker, which must by this time have arrived.

When he reached Mont-Mer, the testimony continued, he had given a fict.i.tious name, gained the sympathy and credence of the doctor and undertaker, and finally, by a clever ruse, escaped from town as custodian of the body of the very man whom he had planned to kill.

Knowing that Marstan was dead, he felt himself completely secure and foot-free to carry out his designs. The only person upon whom he did not reckon, because he didn't know of his existence, was Richard Glover.

The one missing link in the story was supplied by evidence which, although circ.u.mstantial, seemed undeniably convincing to the jury. The woman who had notified the coroner must also have been an inmate of Rest Hollow, the mistress of Marstan, who had lived in ease and luxury, unknown to the physician's employer or any one else. She knew that her reputation lay in Kenwick's hands. She was tired of Marstan and was eager but afraid to escape. The criminal had supplied her with the means at small cost. The time of the disclosure of the crime had been skilfully worked out between them. And it had been executed with a masterly skill. Depot authorities had reported later that a woman traveling alone had bought a ticket on the late train for San Francisco that evening. The station-agent remembered the incident perfectly. By good luck Kenwick had caught the same train. They had traveled to the city together.

Glover, who had been recalled to the stand and was giving this testimony, stated that upon dismissing the detective from his employ he had followed the case himself and was certain that Kenwick and his accomplice had lived together intermittently in San Francisco, and that he had been supplying her with funds.

It was at this point that Roger Kenwick, who had been sitting like a man frozen to his chair, suddenly electrified the court-room by springing to his feet. He had forgotten his surroundings, was contemptuous of the formalities, oblivious to everything save the insolent a.s.surance in Richard Glover's eyes, and the steady gaze with which Marcreta Morgan's brother was regarding him. His sensitive nostrils quivered like those of a highly strung race-horse. His hands, those hands so impatient of delay, were clenched till the knuckles showed through the drawn skin like k.n.o.bs of ivory. He struggled to speak but no words came. Then he became aware of the fact that the sheriff was forcing him back into his seat. Dayton leaned over and whispered sharply to him. "Sit down, man.

You'll kill your case. What do you want them to think of you?"

The words recalled him to his surroundings. From sheer physical weakness he sank back into his chair. Another moment intervened while the auditors relaxed from the moment of tension. Then out of the deathly silence came Dayton's voice again, calm and with no trace of excitement.

"You say that when you first discovered the prisoner in San Francisco you employed a detective to help you on his case, Mr. Glover. Look around the court-room. Is that man present?"

"He is." There was a shade of reluctance in the reply.

"What is his name?"

"Granville Jarvis."

The next moment Glover had stepped down from the stand and resumed his place at the far end of the long table. Dayton leaned across to his client. "Jarvis?" he inquired, his pencil poised above his pad.

"Granville Jarvis; is that the name?"

The light had gone out of Kenwick's eyes and the fire out of his voice.

He had crumpled down in his chair like a man suddenly overcome with a spinal disease. He looked at Dayton with dead eyes.

"The name," he said bitterly, "is Judas Iscariot!"

CHAPTER XVIII

It was two o'clock before court, which had been dismissed for lunch after Richard Glover's testimony, convened again. During the noon hour a tray containing the only tempting food which the prisoner had seen since his incarceration was brought up to his cell. It had become apparent to the jailer that he had friends, and perhaps he was moved thereby to a tardy compa.s.sion. But Kenwick, despite Dayton's admonition to "Brace up and eat a good meal," waved it indifferently aside.

"I'm done for," he said simply. "I don't see how any twelve men could hear the evidence that was presented this morning and find me innocent.

And by the time Jarvis gets through telling anything he likes, and proving it----Well, it appears that every person who has been connected in any way with me since this trouble fell upon me has taken advantage of my misfortune to enrich himself. I don't care much now what they do with me. When you lose your faith in humanity it's time to die. I'm no religious fanatic, Dayton, but for these last two months I've thanked G.o.d on my knees every night of my life for having brought me back into the light. Now I wish that I had died instead."

Dayton made no further effort to rouse him from his despair. For although not of a sensitive or particularly intuitive temperament himself, he had come to realize the utter impossibility of finding this other man in his trouble. "You don't seem to have much faith in me," was all he said as he made some notes on the back of an envelope. But he finally induced his client to eat some of the food upon his tray and after the first few mouthfuls Kenwick was surprised to find that he was ravenously hungry.

"That's something like," the lawyer approved, as they made their way back through the court-house grounds. "Now you're good for another three hours."

It hadn't seemed possible to Kenwick that he was, that his nerves could stand the strain of hours and hours more of this, and there was no a.s.surance that the ordeal would end to-day or to-morrow. But Dayton's easy a.s.surance gave him a new grip upon himself.

They found the audience waiting and eager. None of them seemed to have moved since they had been dismissed for recess two hours before. Only the jury were absent, but five minutes after Kenwick's arrival they filed in and took their places. The district attorney appeared to have lost interest in the case. He sat staring out of the window with a sort of wistful impatience as though he were visualizing a potential game of golf. Dayton glanced at some notes on the table at his elbow and issued his first command. "Call Madeleine Marstan."

In response to this summons one of the veiled women in the rear of the room rose and came forward. She was quietly dressed in a gown of clinging black silk and a black turban with a touch of amethyst. Every eye in the court-room was fixed upon her, but she took the oath with the unembarra.s.sed self-possession of one long accustomed to the public gaze.

Kenwick, turned toward her, detected a faint odor of heliotrope.

"Where do you live, Mrs. Marstan?" Dayton inquired.

She gave a street and number in San Francisco.

"What is your occupation?"

"I am an actress."

"Do you know the prisoner?"

Without glancing at him she replied, with her unruffled composure, "I do."

"How long have you known him?"

"About two months."

"Describe the occasion on which he was first brought to your notice."

She settled back slightly in her chair, like a traveler making herself comfortable for what promised to be a long journey. "It was on the afternoon of November 19 that my husband, a physician, came into our apartment in San Francisco and announced to me that he had just secured a remunerative position with a wealthy man down at Mont-Mer. He said that the work would begin immediately and we must be ready to leave the following day. I asked him for more details and he told me that the position was a secretaryship which would involve little labor and afford us a luxurious home with excellent salary. He had never been a success in his profession, owing chiefly to the fact that he was dissipated, and I had seriously considered leaving him and going back to the stage. But I had decided to give him another chance, and since he appeared to find my questions concerning this new work annoying, I agreed to go and allow him to explain more fully when we should arrive.

"We went down in our own car and arrived at Rest Hollow in mid-afternoon. My husband showed me over the house and grounds and I thought I had never seen such a beautiful place. There was no one about when we came, and after he had given me every opportunity to be favorably impressed with the new home, we went to an upstairs sitting-room in the left wing, and he told me, while he smoked one of the expensive-looking cigars that he found there, further details concerning his employer. I learned that he was an invalid, a young man by the name of Roger Kenwick, who was recuperating from too strenuous service overseas. We discussed the matter for only a few minutes before my husband announced that it was time for him to go to the depot and meet his charge, who was being brought up from Los Angeles by the previous companion, who had taken him there to be outfitted with winter clothes.