The Thinking Machine Collected Stories Part 47

"I don't want his devotion!" blazed Miss Farrar. "The mere sight of him is intolerable to me. It's all just like-like I was being sold to him. It's perfectly hideous, and I won't-I won't-I won't!"

Defiance melted into tears of anger and mortification, and Miss Farrar lay against Miss Langham's shoulder while her slender figure was shaken by a storm of sobs. Miss Langham stroked the crisp, brown hair back from the white temples, and continued to stare dreamily out of the window.

"Even my father and mother and brother conspired with him against me," Miss Farrar sobbed after a time. "They insisted on the marriage from the first, merely because Mr. Devore happens to be wealthy. I don't know why I ever agreed, unless it was just desperation. I detest the man, and yet the members of my own family, knowing that, could only think of the brilliant match, the money, and social position which marriage would bring."

"To-morrow it was to have been," mused Miss Langham vacantly.

"Yes, to-morrow. For weeks and weeks it has been a nightmare to me, and last night, somehow, I seemed to go all to pieces. The sight of the wedding gown made me perfectly furious. All to-day I thought of it, and thought of it, until my head seemed bursting. Then late this afternoon I could stand it no longer; so I-I ran away. I suppose it's horrid of me, and I know my father and mother will never forgive me for the scandal it will cause; but I don't care. They've made me almost hate them. I'm going to my aunt's in Albany and remain there for a few days. Of course, my father will be furious, and will try to force me to return; but she's a dear loyal soul and won't let them take me away. Then I shall decide about the future."

"I can't imagine a worse fate than marriage with a man whom you don't love," said Miss Langham after a pause. "I don't blame you at all. But remember, my dear, in giving up your family you will have to look out for yourself-perhaps earn your own living?"

"I don't care," continued Miss Farrar pa.s.sionately. "I have fifty or sixty dollars now, and before that is gone surely I can get a place as teacher, or governess, or something. I will do something."

"And I have no doubt that everything will come right," Miss Langham a.s.sured her. She raised the tear stained face between her hands and printed a kiss on each damp cheek. "And now, my dear, you need repose. Lie down and rest for awhile."

With the obedience of a child Miss Farrar lay across the berth, and after awhile, with Miss Langham's hand clasped between her own, closed her red, swollen eyes in sleep.

It was perhaps half an hour later that Miss Langham pressed her call b.u.t.ton beside the door. A porter appeared.

"What is the next stop?" she inquired.

"East Newlands," was the reply.

"Can I send a telegram from there?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Miss Langham gently detached her fingers from the clinging clasp of the sleeping girl, and scribbled a telegram on a blank which the porter offered. It was addressed to J. Charles Wingate, in a small city, just beyond Albany, and said:

Have changed my mind. This is irrevocable. M.

When the train pulled into Albany the following morning Miss Julia Farrar was found dead in her berth, fully dressed, except for her hat. A thirty-two caliber bullet had entered her body just below the left shoulder. Miss Langham herself gave the alarm. When physicians came they agreed that Miss Farrar had been dead for at least two hours.

Professor Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen-The Thinking Machine-absorbed, digested, and a.s.similated all the known facts in the problem of the private compartment. Instantly that singular, penetrating brain beneath the mop of tangled, straw yellow hair was alive with questions.

"Who is Miss Langham?" was the first query.

"She is the daughter of Daniel Eustace Langham, president of a national bank in his home city," replied Hutchinson Hatch, reporter. "She and Miss Farrar were cla.s.smates in Va.s.sar, and met by accident on the train."

"Do you know they met by accident?"

"It seems to have been by accident," the reporter amended. "As a matter of fact, Miss Langham was on the train first-in fact, had engaged the drawing room compartment a couple of days ahead."

"Does she know-Miss Langham, I mean- know Devore?"

"Very well indeed," responded the reporter. "A couple of years ago he was rather a.s.siduous in his attentions to her. That was before Devore met Miss Farrar."

The Thinking Machine turned suddenly in his chair and squinted into the eyes of the newspaper man. Faint corrugations in the dome-like brow were swept away.

"Oh!" he exclaimed. "An old love affair! How did it come to be broken off?"

"I imagine it was Devore who broke it off," replied Hatch. "When he met Miss Farrar it resulted in a quick transfer of attentions. As a matter of fact, he doesn't seem to be a very pleasant sort of person, anyway-spoiled son and sole heir of a man worth millions. You know what that means."

"And where was Miss Langham going at the time of the tragedy?" inquired the scientist.

"To visit some friends just beyond Albany."

For a long time The Thinking Machine was silent, while Hatch turned over those vague impressions which the scientist's manner and words had created.

"That seems to simplify the matter somewhat," mused The Thinking Machine at last.

"You don't mean," blurted Hatch quickly-"you don't mean that Miss Langham could have had anything to do with Miss Farrar's death?"

"Why not?" demanded The Thinking Machine coldly.

"But her social position, her wealth, everything, would seem to remove her beyond the range of suspicion," Hatch protested.

The Thinking Machine regarded him with frank disapproval. "Two and two always make four, Mr. Hatch," he said shortly. "We have here a motive for the crime-jealousy-and practically exclusive opportunity. Social position and wealth do not deter criminals; they only make them more cunning. In this case two and two make four so obviously that I am surprised Miss Langham wasn't arrested immediately. Where is she now, by the way?"

"With her father and mother at the Hotel Bellevoir in town here," Hatch responded. "Immediately after the tragedy was reported she returned here, and her father and mother joined her. She is now suffering from shock, and inaccessible-at least to reporters."

"Any physician?"

"Dr. Barrow and Dr. Curtis are attending her."

"I may call on her in person," remarked The Thinking Machine. "And now about this man Devore? Have you seen him?"

"He was the first man the police wanted to see," explained the reporter. "They have already made him account for his every move on the night of the murder. Of course, a motive in his case would be obvious-anger, revenge, jealousy, anything."

"And where was he between, say, midnight and breakfast that night?"

"He says he was asleep at home."

"He says!" snapped The Thinking Machine abruptly. "Don't you know?"

"Not of my knowledge."

"Well, find out!" was the curt instruction. "That isn't one of the things that we can be at all uncertain about."

Hatch opened his eyes again. Here were two lines of investigation laid out by the scientist, either one of which might, if pursued to a logical conclusion, convict a person of wealth and position of a terrible crime.

"And Miss Farrar's family?" continued The Thinking Machine mercilessly. "Where were her father and brother that night?"

"Surely you can't believe that--"

"I never believe anything, Mr. Hatch, until I know it. I merely wanted to know where they were; for on that side too it is possible to conceive a motive for Miss Farrar's death."

"There has been no inquiry in that direction at all," explained the bewildered reporter. "I'll begin one."