The Thinking Machine Collected Stories Part 171

"Drop in on me early to-morrow morning, and bring Mr. Mallory."

Events were cyclonic on that last morning. Mallory and Hatch had hardly arrived when there came a telephone message for the detective from police headquarters. Mrs. Cecelia Montgomery was there. She had come in voluntarily, and asked for Mr. Mallory.

"Don't rush off now," requested The Thinking Machine, who was pottering around among the retorts, and microscopes and what not on his worktable. "Ask them to detain her until you get there. Also, ask her just what relationship existed between Miss Danbury and Henry Sumner." The detective went out; the scientist turned to Hatch. "Here is a hatpin," he said. "Some time this morning we shall have another caller. If, during the presence of that person in this room, I voluntarily put anything to my lips, a bottle, say, or anything is forced upon me, and I do not remove it in just thirty seconds, you will thrust this hatpin through my cheek. Don't hesitate."

"Thrust it through?" the reporter repeated. An uncanny chill ran over him as he realized the scientist's meaning. "Is it absolutely necessary to take such a chance to--"

"I say if I don't remove it!" The Thinking Machine interrupted shortly. "You and Mallory will be watching from another room; I shall demonstrate the exact manner of the murders." There was a troubled look in the reporter's face. "I shall be in no danger," the scientist said simply. "The hatpin is merely a precaution if anything should go wrong."

After a little Mallory entered, with clouded countenance.

"She denies the murders," he announced, "but admits that the hand prints in blood are hers. According to her yarn, she searched Miss Danbury's room and Sumner's room after the murders to find some family papers which were necessary to establish claims to some estate-I don't quite understand. She hurt her hand in Miss Danbury's room, and it bled a lot, hence the hand print. From there she went straight to Sumner's room, and presumably left the smudge there. It seems that Sumner was a distant cousin of Miss Danbury's-the only son of a younger brother who ran away years ago after some wild escapade, and came to this country. George Parsons, the copper king, is the only other relative in this country. She advises us to warn him to be on his guard-seems to think he will be the next victim."

"He's already warned," said The Thinking Machine, "and he has gone West on important business."

Mallory stared.

"You seem to know more about this case than I do," he sneered.

"I do," a.s.serted the scientist, "quite a lot more."

"I think the third degree will change Mrs. Montgomery's story some," the detective declared. "Perhaps she will remember better--"

"She is telling the truth."

"Then why did she run away? How was it we found her handkerchief in Mr. Willing's office after the Pittman affair? How was it--"

The Thinking Machine shrugged his shoulders, and was silent. A moment later the door opened, and Martha appeared, her eyes blazing with indignation.

"That man who swore at me over the telephone," she announced distinctly, "wants to see you, sir."

Mallory's keen eyes swept the faces of the scientist and the reporter, trying to fathom the strange change that came over them.

"You are sure, Martha?" asked The Thinking Machine.

"Indeed I am, sir." She was positive about it. "I'd never forget his voice, sir."

For an instant her master merely stared at her, then dismissed her with a curt, "Show him in," after which he turned to the detective and Hatch.

"You will wait in the next room," he said tersely. "If anything happens, Mr. Hatch, remember."

The Thinking Machine was sitting when the visitor entered-a middle-aged man, sharp-featured, rather spare, brisk in his movements, and distinctly well groomed. It was Herbert Willing, attorney. In one hand he carried a small bag. He paused an instant, and gazed at the diminutive scientist curiously.

"Come in, Mr. Willing," The Thinking Machine greeted. "You want to see me about--" He paused questioningly.

"I understand," said the lawyer suavely, "that you have interested yourself in these recent-er-remarkable murders, and there are some points I should like to discuss with you. I have some papers in my bag here, which"-he opened it-"may be of interest. Some er-newspaper man informed me that you have certain information indicating the person--"

"I know the name of the murderer," said The Thinking Machine.

"Indeed! May I ask who it is?"

"You may. His name is Herbert Willing."

Watching tensely Hatch saw The Thinking Machine pa.s.s his hand slowly across his mouth as if to stifle a yawn; saw Willing leap forward suddenly with what seemed to be a bottle in his hand; saw him force the scientist back into his chair, and thrust the bottle against his lips. Instantly came a sharp click, and some hideous change came over the scientist's wizened face. His eyes opened wide in terror, his cheeks seemed to collapse. Instinctively he grasped the bottle with both hands.

For a scant second Willing stared at him, his countenance grown demoniacal; then he swiftly took something else from the small bag, and smashed it on the floor. It was a drinking gla.s.s!

After which the scientist calmly removed the bottle from his lips.

"The broken drinking gla.s.s," he said quietly, "completes the evidence."

Hutchinson Hatch was lean and wiry, and hard as nails; Detective Mallory's bulk concealed muscles of steel, but it took both of them to overpower the attorney. Heedless of the struggling trio The Thinking Machine was curiously scrutinizing the black bottle. The mouth was blocked by a small rubber ball, which he had thrust against it with his tongue a fraction of an instant before the dreaded power the bottle held had been released by pressure upon a cunningly concealed spring. When he raised his squinting eyes at last, Willing, manacled, was glaring at him in impotent rage. Fifteen minute later the four were at police headquarters; Mrs. Montgomery was awaiting them.

"Mrs. Montgomery, why,"-and the petulant pale-blue eyes of The Thinking Machine were fixed upon her face-"why didn't you go to Concord, as you had said?"

"I did go there," she replied. "It was simply that when news came of Miss Danbury's terrible death I was frightened, I lost my head; I pleaded with my friends not to let it be known that I was there, and they agreed. If any one had searched their house I would have been found; no one did. At last I could stand it no longer. I came to the city, and straight here to explain everything I knew in connection with the affair."

"And the search you made of Miss Danbury's room? And of Sumner's room?"

"I've explained that," she said. "I knew of the relationship between poor Harry Sumner and Violet Danbury, and I knew each of them had certain papers which were of value as establishing their claims to a great estate in England now in litigation. I was sure those papers would be valuable to the only other claimant, who was--"

"Mr. George Parsons, the copper king," interposed the scientist. "You didn't find the papers you sought because Willing had taken them. That estate was the thing he wanted, and I dare say by some legal jugglery he would have gotten it." Again he turned to face Mrs. Montgomery. "Living with Miss Danbury, as you did, you probably held a key to her apartment? Yes. You had only the difficulty then, of entering the hotel late at night, unseen, and that seemed to be simple. Willing did it the night he killed Miss Danbury, and left it unseen, as you did. Now, how did you enter Sumner's room?"

"It was a terrible place," and she shuddered slightly. "I went in alone, and entered his room through a window from a fire escape. The newspapers, you will remember, described its location precisely, and--"

"I see," The Thinking Machine interrupted. He was silent a moment. "You're a shrewd man, Willing, and your knowledge of natural philosophy is exact if not extensive. Of course, I knew if you thought I knew too much about the murders you would come to me. You did. It was a trap, if that's any consolation to you. You fell into it. And, curiously enough, I wasn't afraid of a knife or a shot; I knew the instrument of death you had been using was too satisfactory and silent for you to change. However, I was prepared for it, and-I think that's all." He arose.

"All?" Hatch and Mallory echoed the word. "We don't understand--"

"Oh!" and The Thinking Machine sat down again. "It's logic. Miss Danbury was dead-neither shot, stabbed, poisoned, nor choked; 'absence of air in her lungs,' the physicians said. Instantly the vacuum bottle suggested itself. That murder, as was the murder of Sumner, was planned to counterfeit suicide, hence the broken goblet on the floor. Incidentally the murder of Sumner informed me that the crimes were the work of a madman, else there was an underlying purpose which might have arisen through a relationship. Ultimately I established that relationship through Professor Meredith, in whom Miss Danbury had confided to a certain extent; at the same time he convinced me of his innocence in the affair.

"Now," he continued, after a moment, "we come to the murder of Pittman. Pittman learned, and tried to phone me, who the murderer was. Willing heard that message. He killed Pittman, then bound and gagged himself, and waited. It was a clever ruse. His story of being overpowered and drugged is absurd on the face of it, yet he asked us to believe that by leaving a handkerchief of Mrs. Montgomery's on the floor. That was reeking with drugs. Mr. Hatch can give you more of these details." He glanced at his watch. "I'm due at a luncheon, where I am to make an address to the Society of Psychical Research. If you'll excuse me--"

He went out; the others sat staring after him.

THE GREAT AUTO MYSTERY.

I.

WITH a little laugh of sheer light-heartedness on her lips and a twinkle in her blue eyes, Marguerite Melrose bound on a grotesque automobile mask, and stuffed the last strand of her recalcitrant hair beneath her veil. The pretty face was hidden from mouth to brow; and her curls were ruthlessly imprisoned under a cap held in place by the tightly tied veil.

"It's perfectly hideous, isn't it?" she demanded of her companions.

Jack Curtis laughed.