"For God's sake, Professor, come at once. Two of us were killed. Come—" The voice ended in a croak and there was no more.

When it became apparent that the other had dropped his receiver, Professor Brierly turned the crank until he got the attention of the operator. It took a long time to be connected with the nearest police officer.

Professor Brierly identified himself and said:

"Two men were killed in Justice Higginbotham's camp. You know where that is?"

"Yes, sir."

"How soon can you have a man or two down there?"

"Hold the wire a moment, sir. I'll tell you." After a brief interval the voice asked: "Are you there, sir?"

"Yes."

"We can have one man, perhaps two there in half an hour, sir."

"Very well. I was going down there. Will your man stop here for me on the way down?"

"Yes, sir. This is at Mr. McCall's camp, is it not?"

"Yes."

"Good-by."

Professor Brierly now called up the Higginbotham camp for additional details. The overhanging rock had fallen, carrying with it the porch. The house was not much damaged. Professor Brierly surmised that the one thing that saved the house was the weakness with which the porch had been attached to the main building.



Chapter XIX

The swift boat bearing two police officers picked up Professor Brierly and Matthews. McCall and Jimmy left immediately. The avid horde of newspaper men had swooped down on the Higginbotham camp. Only the fact that they had two red-coated men in the boat enabled the old scientist and his assistant to get near the house. A path was cleared and the four men went into the living-room where the eight survivors, Jimmy Hale, McCall and as many newspaper men and women as could find standing room were crowded.

The two officers with the help of two others who had arrived cleared the room after considerable difficulty. The porch had been shorn off the building as though it were done with tools. The huge rock was nestling at the edge of the water.

Jimmy was surprised at the demeanor of the eight survivors. The reaction had set in. Now that the worst had come, come right before their eyes they took it with a sang-froid that was surprising under the circumstances. Pride of race, the knowledge that a great many persons had their eyes upon them, the knowledge that the entire world had their eyes on them through their representatives of the press had its influence.

Samuel Goldberg and Lorenzo Tonti, the man who had influenced the framing of the Tontine insurance agreement, were killed outright by the falling of the rock. Two of the others suffered minor injuries. While they were calm the eight survivors were grim. They looked toward Professor Brierly.

"How did it happen?" he asked quietly.

Mr. Marshall answered.

"Six or seven of us were on the porch, the rest of us were inside, finishing breakfast. McGuire was just coming up from the lake, he had been out. The rock, without any warning, came down. Poor Sam. He always sat where he could see the rock. It had a fascination for him. He always alluded to the possibility of its coming down."

Charles Rochambeau leaned forward in his chair tensely.

"Well, Professor, you could not save us from this could you?" He sprang up and threw his hands up with true Gallic violence. "My God, when will this end?"

There was pain, grief in the deep-set eyes that looked at the excitable old man. Professor Brierly said slowly:

"It will end right now, Mr. Rochambeau. It has ended." He turned to the two officers who had come with him, saying:

"A man by the name of Amos Brown, who lives about six miles up the lake was shot to death this morning."

Bruce Thomas started forward, crying hoarsely:

"No, no. Amos Brown died thirty years ago."

Professor Brierly, ignoring the interruption, pointed at former Police Commissioner McGuire. "This man, officer, probably is armed. You will find that the bullet that killed Amos Brown came from his weapon."

One of the officers took a step toward the ruddy octogenarian. Jimmy stared, startled. Something was coming off that he did not understand. Three of the men sprang to their feet glaring at the principal actors to this strange scene. McGuire stood up, the blood gradually draining from his face. One of the police officers asked quietly, holding out his hand:

"Are you armed, sir?" As McGuire's hand slowly went toward his side pocket, the officer said:

"Give me the weapon, please."

McGuire stared a long time at Professor Brierly, at his comrades, at the officers. He said:

"Yes, I killed Brown. I killed him in self-defense." He drew out the weapon, slowly.

Professor Brierly's voice, in the strained silence that had fallen on the group, sounded like a death knell.

"You did not kill Goldberg and Tonti in self-defense. You did not engineer the killing of Schurman, Miller and Flynn in self-defense. You—John!" Professor Brierly's voice suddenly rose to a hoarse shout. The weapon in the hand of the stout, erect, pale man was slowly turning. Matthews sprang forward, but the officer reached McGuire first. There was a brief struggle for the weapon. Two officers led the man away.

There was pain in Professor Brierly's eyes, and not the exhilaration to be found at the successful conclusion of an experiment in science; or the completed solution of a crime. He sat down and appeared reluctant to furnish the explanation that was expected of him. Suddenly Justice Higginbotham burst out:

"But this is unthinkable, Professor. He was a comrade of ours. He was here with us all the time. He—you must be mistaken." He stopped and then continued more slowly, gravely:

"Professor Brierly, you will have to give a very good reason for your astounding charge. You will have to remove every reasonable doubt. I am not talking in the legal sense now. This man was our comrade. I should as soon believe that I did this impossible, this terrible thing myself."

A swift glance about the circle of faces showed Jimmy that they were all of the same mind. Professor Brierly said:

"I understand. That is why I was reluctant to make the charge sooner, when we discussed it the other day. Some of you urged me, remember, to make a guess, which I could have done then. This terrible thing that happened this morning is something I could hardly foresee." He paused and went on.

"Your number '14' Amos Brown died twenty-eight years ago, being survived by a son and grandson. The son died a short time later. Amos Brown the third, had no kin. But he was a self-sufficient youngster who managed pretty well. He entered the flying service in the World War and returned a bitter, disillusioned man.

"He became a hatter and worked in Danbury, Connecticut, for a time, in a department called the 'pouncing' department. In such a department, they shave off the rough fur of felt hats after they have been dyed. In a 'pouncing' room, although there are blowers to take up the fine fur, there is nevertheless a good deal of it flying about in the air. I am thus dwelling on this seemingly trivial point because it formed an important clue in my investigation.

"Several years ago, young Amos Brown was approached by a man who was alleged to have been a comrade of his grandfather in the Civil War. Amos Brown was persuaded that your Tontine group had treated his grandfather very badly. He was shown that by working with this old veteran he could not only revenge his grandfather's wrongs, but also obtain a false justice for himself.

"This kind benefactor, as an evidence of goodwill, bought Amos Brown a farm in Canada; he bought him a plane. He then convinced him that by helping kill off the Tontine group the two of them would share their huge fund.

"Preparations were carefully made. Amos Brown was a strong, active man. The veteran had access to files where the peculiarities of a great many criminals, in and out of prison, were carefully recorded. It was recorded for example that one man had the habit of getting into places by using climbing irons. Another had a different method but he had a weakness for large quantities of food when he committed a robbery, his special weakness being for eggs. It was comparatively easy for a former police commissioner to get all this information you see, a police commissioner who kept in touch with his old department.

"But first of all the murders had to be so committed that they would look like suicide. The former man hunter knew enough to make them look like suicides to the casual examiner. But suppose a careful examination were made of a particular death, and it was discovered to be murder. Then what?

"Then you see, the peculiarities of a certain criminal would appear so prominently that the police would pick this man up and pin the crime on him. But suppose again this innocent criminal happened to have an unshakable alibi? That could be arranged for too. The alibi could be made to look 'fishy', as my friend Hale would put it.

"Former Police Commissioner McGuire knew that 'Chicago' Boyle, alias 'Lefty' Harris was in this neighborhood. 'Lefty' had been convicted of entering a house with rope, climbing irons, and so forth. So first of all, Miller was killed in a manner that would look to the casual examiner like suicide. When I pointed out that it was not suicide and further pointed out how the murderer entered, it was a foregone conclusion that Boyle would be picked up.

"Boyle had a story, but what policeman or jury would believe it? The stranger who met him in a speakeasy and drugged his drink took good care that he would not have a convincing one to tell.

"The one flaw in the reckoning of the murderer was that the rope, with which entry was made, was found. It showed me as definitely as though I had seen it, the farmyard where Amos Brown lived. The twine also showed me that it had been in a 'pouncing' room in a hat factory for a long time.

"Boyle's watch which had not been cleaned for a long time and which we placed was in his possession about three years ago did not show that it had ever been in a 'pouncing' room. And you can depend on it, that one could not keep a watch for a single day in such a room without the fur getting inside the case, to say nothing of keeping it there for months or years.

"In the Schurman case, in New York, there was the fortuitous incident of the apple. Amos Brown was not a trained criminal, you see. He did not think, when he bit into the apple that he was leaving what the police call a 'calling card'. It will be found on investigation that Amos Brown's teeth fit into the 'moulage' of the apple.

"In addition to that, unfortunately for the murderer, 'Fingy' had a splendid alibi, an alibi that the killer could not foresee."

"The Flynn murder was easy. The man who made the telephone call need not have known what he was doing. But it is safe to say that it was Brown. Mr. McGuire would trust as few persons as possible in this. The call that killed Flynn might just as well have been made from Canada."

"But, Professor, you accused him of murdering Goldberg and Tonti," protested Judge Fletcher.

"Yes. Justice Higginbotham was going to make a spectacle of his mastery of a hobby. He had everything arranged. He was going to—"

"I had the wires disconnected, Professor, interrupted Judge Higginbotham."

"Connecting the wires would be just about a minute's work."

"But McGuire was down near the water. How could he throw a beam of light at that tube in the daylight."

"That's right, Judge. McGuire was facing the east. The sun was just right to reflect a powerful beam of sunlight into the door to the photo-electric cell with a piece of mirror. If you will look, Judge, you will find that door open.

"The act before that was the kidnapping of Matthews' nephew. Brown, inherently a decent chap, balked at that but he was too involved by then. When they could not make me go to New York, Brown was told to send us a tooth as evidence of what they were prepared to do to the little boy. Brown balked at that too. He obtained some older boy's tooth, probably from a dentist."

He was now speaking more slowly.

"Obviously an octogenarian could not commit these murders himself, but being a former police commissioner, he could easily hire someone to do it for him; he knew the ropes. He could not trust the ordinary killer; he would have placed himself in such a man's power.

"What better instrument than Amos Brown? Amos Brown could be made to believe that he was performing an act of justice by killing the men who had mistreated his grandfather. Such a man is much more dangerous than the professional killer. He was a flyer and a good one. He had a powerful, fast plane, small enough not to attract too much attention. He could kill Schurman in the evening and Miller, four hundred miles away early the following morning.

"Without Brown's knowledge 'Fingy' was watched. If he had not found it necessary to rob the delicatessen store, he might have met a stranger, as did Boyle, who would provide him with an alibi that no one would believe. The work of providing a bad alibi might have been done and probably was done by a person who knew nothing and had no interest in the members of the Tontine group. Such a man as McGuire could easily have arranged that.

"A police commissioner who was wiped out in the stock market crash; a man who was accustomed to the good things in life in a material sense. A man' who was forced to consort with criminals professionally. He was cleaned out in the crash, and never recovered.

"There is a record of a case similar to that of the Miller case. Schurman was killed in the way that Emmeline Reynolds was killed in 1898. In her case a bludgeon was used. In Schurman's case Brown probably used his fist. The similarity in particular originality displayed, the details were masterpieces of subtlety.

"We can picture what happened at Brown's farm this morning. Brown refused to go any further with the plan. We have an indication of Brown's character by the fact that he refused to extract a boy's tooth. Oh, no. It is not at all inconsistent. A man like Brown might commit murder to satisfy his false sense of justice, and yet be tenderhearted enough to refuse to inflict pain on a little boy.

"But the old police commissioner had gone too far. There were words. Brown would be of no further use to him. McGuire had the small mirror in his pocket. He calculated that he would find everyone on the pond. If I did not have a complete case against him, what a perfect case the police commissioner would have had, assuming that he was caught coming from Brown's farm. He could have said that he had revenged the death of his comrades.

"He made two grave errors. The sun's rays which he used with such murderous effect were in his eyes facing the east. The porch being in semi-gloom, he thought perhaps that you were all there. His second error was in overestimating the strength with which the porch was fastened to the main building.

"The documentary proof of what I say is all there, gentlemen, every step of it. The living proof is present, to say nothing of the dead proof. Small things in themselves; powder marks; fresh putty; the absence of hat fur in a watch case; an apple which was too green, or too sour or too bitter. Small things but what an unbreakable chain."

Epilogue

The world was good to James Hale three days later. He stayed in bed until the sun was high in the sky. Nothing to do for nearly a week.

As he went to the bathroom his whistling and vocal efforts vied with the feathered songsters outside the window. As he passed through the living-room on his way to the dining room he picked up a letter addressed to him. The upper left hand corner of the letter told him that it was from the Eagle. He stuffed it carelessly into his pocket. It was probably from one or more members of the gang at the office asking him to smuggle in some Scotch when he came back. It could not be from Hite. Hite never wrote letters. He spoke to his men and women verbally, by telephone or by wire. He even did his firing that way.

He ate his breakfast alone. Matthews and Professor Brierly had gone off somewhere. Norah was in the kitchen singing. Tommy, in the costume with which he had been born, was outside fishing.

Jimmy pushed out the canoe onto the lake and sat there watching Tommy. Tommy never caught anything fishing, but that never disturbs a devotee of the Waltonian art. Tommy had his own methods for the sport. He fished without line, hook or bait. He used neither guile, nor any of the lures employed by fishermen. Tommy stood there in two feet of water staring intently at the denizens of the water darting back and forth. They could plainly be seen, the water was clear. When one of the finny tribe hesitated near the surface of the water Tommy would grab—a fist full of water.

Jimmy tried his blandishments and charm on Tommy without success. Tommy had his own ideas about Jimmy.

Now Pop was a superior sort of person. Pop paid one the compliment of serious consideration. Also, Professor Brierly having taken a course in tricks of magic in his youth, Pop could do the most wonderful things with his hands and with things. He could and did explain everything. But Jimmy was another, but quite different friend.

Uncle Jack could also do fascinating things with his hands. Besides, Uncle Jack was quite the strongest and swiftest person in the world. Tommy like Jack, that was a little to much to expect.

Mummie had a place all her own. She was only a woman, of course, but she was the most beautiful woman in the world, one loved her a lot. She could and did make the most delicious things to eat, she tucked one in bed and other things.

Jimmy now, it was hard to classify Jimmy. In the first place he was so frivolous. He received one's most serious statements with a grin. And it was remarkable that Pop and Uncle Jack would often join Jimmy in discussing the most frivolous topics, topics that one could not understand. Maybe they were doing it to be polite. He had been told about that—about being polite and listening respectfully to strangers. Decidedly Jimmy did not make a hit with Tommy. He was tolerated, but that's all. Right now he was grinning at Tommy's serious efforts to catch fish.

Jimmy's attention wandered. This was swell. A perfect day, nothing to do for nearly a week. He would not even look at his portable during this time. His hand went to his pocket for cigarettes and encountered the letter. He lazily tore open the flap.

He sat up and glowed with pleasure. It was from the publisher of his paper. The publisher wrote of "loyalty to the newspaper ideal," "unstinting, unremitting effort." The letter spoke effusively about Jimmy's recent achievement on the murder story. The letter concluded with the statement that in view of the fact that that splendid story encroached on his vacation, his vacation would be extended with pay for one week.

Now that was something like it. That was appreciation for you. Hite would never—Martha's voice broke in on his rumination. There was a telephone call. He lazily got out of his canoe.

The first voice was Ann's, the second Hite's.

"Say, Jimmy, I got an idea. You know there's bootlegging in Canada. Fact is where sale of liquor is permitted up to certain hours, there are birds who sell it after hours and are subject to fine and imprisonment mebbe. In view of the to do about prohibition and bootlegging in this country, it would be swell to have a feature story about bootlegging in Canada. Run up to Quebec and Montreal and stop at places between and give us a story will you. That Tontine story was a nice story, Jimmy, g'by."

Hite had talked fast in jerky sentences. All Jimmy had said was, "Hello." The wire was dead. Jimmy, with a stony face got out the map of Canada. It showed him what a trip to Quebec and Montreal with stops between would involve. He mumbled: "Quebec-Montreal-stops between-feature story-extend my vacation."

THE END