The Brand of Silence: A Detective Story by Johnston McCulley (read book txt) 📖

Sid always was panicky, you know."

"I didn't know that a panicky man could pick up a million dollars in ten years."

"Oh, I suppose Sidney was fortunate. There are wonderful opportunities at times in Central America, and I suppose he happened to just strike one of them right. He was very fortunate, indeed. Not every man can have good luck like that."

"Well, I'm sorry that I troubled you," Farland said. "And now, I'll get out—if you'll do me a small favor."

"Anything, Farland."

"I see you have a typewriter in the corner, and I'd like to write a short note to leave uptown."

"Just step outside and dictate it to one of my stenographers," said George Lerton.

"That'd be too much trouble," Farland replied. "It's only a few lines, and I can pound a typewriter pretty good. Besides, this is a little confidential report that I would not care to have your stenographer know anything about."

"Oh, I see! Help yourself!"

Farland got up and hurried over to the typewriter. He put a sheet of paper in the machine, wrote a few lines, folded the sheet and put it into his coat pocket.

"Well, I'm much obliged," he said. "I think we'll have Sid out of trouble before long."

"Let us hope so!" George Lerton said.

There was something in the tone of his voice, however, that belied the words he spoke. Farland gave him a single, rapid glance, but the expression of Lerton's face told him nothing. Lerton was a broker and used to big business deals. He was a master of the art of the blank countenance, and Jim Farland knew it well.

Farland had said nothing concerning Kate Gilbert, for he was not ready to let George Lerton know that he suspected any connection of Miss Gilbert with the Rufus Shepley case. Farland was not certain himself what that connection would be, and he knew it would be foolish to say anything that would put Lerton on guard and make the mystery more difficult of solution.

He thanked Lerton once more and departed. Out in the corridor and some distance from the Lerton office, he took from his pocket the note he had written on Lerton's private typewriter and glanced at it quickly. Farland was merely verifying what he had noticed as he had typed the note.

"That was a lucky hunch about that typewriter," he told himself. "This case is going to be interesting, all right—and for several persons."

Farland had noticed particularly the typewritten notes that had been received by the clothing merchant and the barber. There were two certain keys that were battered in a peculiar manner, and another key that was out of alignment.

He knew now, by glancing at the lines he had written himself, that those other notes had been typed on the same machine. He guessed that it had been George Lerton, the broker, who had sent those notes and the money to the barber and the merchant.

Why had George Lerton been so eager to destroy his cousin's alibi?

Why was George Lerton trying to have Sidney Prale sent to the electric chair for murder?

CHAPTER XIII A PLAN OF CAMPAIGN

Naturally, a man facing prosecution on a murder charge is liable to be nervous, whether he is innocent or not. If an attempt is being made to gather evidence that will clear him, he wishes for frequent reports, always hoping that there will be some ray of hope. And so it was with Sidney Prale this morning, as he paced the floor in the living room of his suite in the hotel.

Murk had done everything possible to make Sidney Prale comfortable. Now he merely stood to one side and watched the man who had saved him from a self-inflicted death, and tried to think of something that he could say or do to make Prale easier in his mind.

They had not seen or heard from Jim Farland since the evening before, when he had engaged the taxicab and had started in pursuit of the limousine Kate Gilbert had entered. Prale wondered what Farland had been doing, whether he had discovered anything concerning Kate Gilbert, whether he had found a clew that would lead to an unraveling of the mystery.

"Are you sure about that Farland man, Mr. Prale?" Murk asked, after a time.

"What do you mean by that, Murk?"

"Well, he's a kind of cop, and I never had much faith in cops," said Murk.

"Farland is an old friend of mine, Murk, and he is on the square—if that is what you mean."

"He sure started out like a house afire, sir, but he seems to be fallin' down now," Murk declared. "He sure did handle that barber and the clothin' merchant, but he ain't showed us any speed since he left us last night."

"He is busy somewhere—you may be sure of that," Sidney Prale declared.

"Well, boss, I ain't got any education, and I ain't an expert in any particular line, but I've often been accused of havin' common sense, and I'm strong for you!"

"Meaning what, Murk?"

"Nothin', boss, except that I'd like to be busy gettin' you out of this mess. Seems to me I know just as much about it as you do, and if we'd talk matters over, maybe I'd get some sort of an idea, or somethin' like that."

Prale sat down before the window, lighted a cigar, and looked up at Murk.

"Go ahead," he said. "It won't hurt anything, and it will serve to kill time until we hear from Jim Farland. What do you want to talk about first?"

"It seems to me," said Murk, clearing his throat and attempting to speak in an impressive manner, "that this is a double-barreled affair."

"What do you mean?" Prale asked.

"Well, there's the murder thing, and then there's this thing about you havin' some powerful and secret enemies that are tryin' to do you dirt without even comin' out in the open about it. Maybe them two things are mixed together, and maybe again they ain't. If they ain't, we've got two jobs on our hands."

"And, if they are?" Prale asked.

"Then it looks to me, boss, like the gang that's after you is tryin' to hang this murder on you after havin' had somebody croak that Shepley guy."

"I've thought of that, Murk. But it doesn't look possible," Prale said. "If my enemies merely wanted to hang a murder charge on me, as you have suggested, I think they would have planned better and would have made the evidence against me more conclusive. It would mean that there would be a lot of persons in the secret; the men who plan murder do not like to take the entire town into confidence about it."

"Well, that sounds reasonable," Murk admitted.

"And why Rufus Shepley?"

"Because you had that spat with him in the lobby of the hotel, and it could be shown that you had a reason for knifin' him," Murk said, with evident satisfaction.

"Nobody could have known I was going to have that quarrel with Shepley, because I had no idea of it myself when I entered the hotel lobby," Prale said. "After I left the hotel, I met Farland and then walked down to the river and met you—and you know the rest. How could they have contemplated hanging that crime on me when they did not know but that I had a perfect alibi? I think we're on the wrong track, Murk."

"Well, boss, how about your fountain pen?" Murk asked. "How come it was found beside the body?"

"That is one of the biggest puzzles in the whole thing, Murk. I cannot remember exactly when I had the pen last. I cannot imagine how it got into Shepley's room and on the floor beside his body. That fountain pen of mine is an important factor in this case, Murk, and it has me worried."

"It seems to me," Murk said, "that if I had any powerful enemies after my scalp, I'd know the birds and be watchin' out for them all the time, to see that they didn't start anything when I was lookin' in the other direction."

"But, Murk, I haven't the slightest idea who they are," Sidney Prale declared. "I don't know why I should have enemies that amount to anything, and that is what makes it so puzzling. How can I work this thing out when I don't even know where to start? I wish Jim Farland would come."

Jim Farland did, at that moment. Murk let him in, and the detective tossed his hat on a chair, sat down in another, lighted one of his own black cigars, and looked at Sidney Prale through narrowed eyes.

"Well, Jim?" Prale asked.

"I talk when I've really got something to say, but I'm not going to make general conversation and muddle your brains with a lot of scattered junk," Jim Farland replied. "I'll say this much—things are looking much better for you."

"That sounds good, Jim. Can't you tell me anything?" Prale asked, sitting forward on his chair.

"The barber and the clothing merchant have fixed up a part of your alibi, Sid, as perhaps Murk has told you. That is the first point. It makes it look impossible for you to have slain Rufus Shepley, and I think Lawyer Coadley could get the charge against you dismissed on that alone."

"But I want to be entirely cleared."

"Exactly. You don't want to leave the slightest doubt in the mind of a single person. There is but one way to clear you absolutely, Sid. We've got to show conclusively that you could not have killed Shepley, and the best way to do that is to find the person who did."

"I understand, Jim."

"There seems to be some sort of a mysterious alliance against you, Sid. You say that you can't understand why you should have enemies that hate you so, and I know you're telling the truth. Whether that business has anything to do with the murder, or not, I am not prepared to say now. But we want to find out about this enemy business, too, don't we?"

"Certainly," Prale said.

"I followed Kate Gilbert. I know where she lives. She does not belong to a rich family and does not live in splendor. But she wears expensive gowns and has plenty of spending money, and has mysterious dealings with a distinguished-looking man. Her father is mixed up in it in some way, too. I went through their apartment, Sid. Somebody in that apartment wrote the anonymous notes you received."

"What?" Prale gasped.

"I found a tablet of the same sort of paper, and scraps of writing in the wastebasket that were in the same hand. Think, Sid! On the ship——"

"By George!" Prale exclaimed. "She could have slipped into my stateroom and pinned that note to my pillow, and she could have stuck the second one on my suit case as I walked past her on the deck."

"And could have sent the others," Farland added.

"But, why?" Prale demanded. "I never saw the woman until I met her at a social affair in Honduras. What could she or any of her people have against me?"

"Perhaps it was the maid," Farland said.

"She could have done it, of course, the same as Kate Gilbert," Prale said. "But the same difficulty holds good—why? Kate Gilbert did seem to avoid me, and I caught her big maid glaring at me once or twice as if she hated the sight of me. But why on earth——"

Farland cleared his throat. "Here is another thought for you to digest," he said. "This Kate Gilbert knows your cousin, George Lerton."

Sidney Prale suddenly sat up straight in his chair again, his eyes blinking rapidly.

"Doesn't that open up possibilities?" Jim Farland asked him. "The woman seems to be working against you for some reason, and we know that George Lerton lied about meeting you on Fifth Avenue that night. It appears that he is working against you, too, for some mysterious motive."

A dangerous gleam came into Sidney Prale's eyes. "That simplifies matters," he said. "I'll watch for Kate Gilbert, and when I see her I'll ask why she sent me those notes. Then I'll get George Lerton alone and choke out of him why he lied about meeting me on the Avenue. I've trimmed worse men than George Lerton."

"You'll be a good little boy and do nothing of the sort," Farland told him. "We are playing a double game, remember—trying to solve this enemy business, and at the same time trying to clear you of a murder charge. If any of those persons get the idea that we are unduly interested in them, we may not have such an easy time of it."

"I understand that, of course."

"Let me tell you a few more things, Sid. I saw Lerton talking to Miss Gilbert on the street. They were speaking in very low tones. When they parted, I followed Lerton to his office, and went in and talked to him. I did