CHAPTER VI
A Trap for Tremaine
"WELL," I said, at last, “it seems to me we’re weaving a pretty strong chain about our friend Tremaine. But why should he have waited this long to look for the diamond?”
“Perhaps he’s just discovered its loss,” suggested Godfrey.
“Or perhaps this is the first opportunity he’s had. I’ve never before left him alone here, and I keep the snap on so that the door locks itself whenever it’s closed.”
Godfrey sat for a full minute motionless, his eyes fixed on the door.
“Of course,” he said, at last, “it may not have been the diamond he was looking for, though I can’t imagine what else it could be. But I’ve a theory I want to test. Suppose we take a look at your bedroom.”
I followed him in and turned up the light. He glanced around keenly, and went finally to the closet, which was almost opposite the door leading into the sitting-room. He entered the closet and closed the door behind him. After a moment, I heard a scraping noise, and perceived a knife-blade working back and forth in a crack of the door. Finally the blade was withdrawn, the door opened, and Godfrey came out. He examined the lock, tried it once or twice with the key, which was in it; then he turned to me.
“What time do you leave in the morning?” he asked.
“About seven-thirty.”
“Seven-thirty—very well. Now I must be going. Look for me in the morning.”
“In the morning?”
“Yes—I’ll explain afterwards. Now let me out softly.”
“Wait,” I said, for I too had a sudden idea. “You have a photograph of Thompson, I suppose?”
“Yes, at the office.”
“Bring it up in the morning with you. I should like to look at it.”
“All right,” he said, and after I had made sure that the coast was clear, he stole away upon tiptoe.
For a long time after he had gone, I sat and thought over the evening’s events. In the first place, he had given me a complete and succinct story of the crime; I felt that I held in my hands all the details of the tragedy—all the threads that led toward its solution. As Godfrey had pointed out, the foundation was as yet too weak to support a theory—we needed more facts to build upon. The strands of circumstance we had woven about Tremaine were really mere cobwebs—any breath of wind might blow them away. Was there really any connection between him and Thompson? That they had both lived in the tropics proved nothing; and they could hardly have come to New York together, since the Tremaines had arrived at the Marathon fully three weeks before Thompson appeared there.
At least, I told myself, I could find out on which boat the Tremaines had come, since I knew the approximate date of their arrival. If Thompson proved to be a fellow-passenger of theirs we had taken an important step forward; if not, some other bit of evidence might possibly be stumbled upon. That should be my task for the luncheon-hour tomorrow; till then, I would permit myself to consider none of the other details of the mystery-I knew how easy it was to get inextricably tangled in a maze of conjecture—and with this resolve I went to bed.
But, as it happened, my noon hour was to be differently occupied. Scarcely was I out of bed next morning, when there came a light tap on my door and Godfrey slipped in the instant I opened it.
“I had a few properties to arrange,” he explained, smiling, “and so thought I’d best come early.”
He went on into the bedroom and opened the closet door. Then he took from his pocket a stout bolt, with screws and a screw-driver, and proceeded to affix it to the inside of the door.
“Now, my dear Lester,” he said, rising when the task was finished, “I’ll have to ask you to run up this noon and let me out.”
“Let you out of where?”
“Out of the closet. You see, unfortunately, this lock works only from the outside, so you’ll have to lock me in before you go. I’ve put on the bolt as an extra precaution.”
“You mean you’re going to spend the whole morning in that closet?”
“That’s precisely what I mean.”
“But you’ll suffocate.”
“No—you see I’ve cut a hole through. That will let in the air; besides, through it one can get an admirable view of the outer room.”
“Ah!” I said, beginning to understand. “It’s a trap!”
“Yes, a trap. Maybe we’ll catch something and maybe we won’t. What time do you usually go to lunch?”
“About one o’clock.”
“That ought to bring you here by one-thirty. Very well; lock me in and take the key with you.”
I did as he bade me, though not without some reluctance, and I confess that I thought of little else during the morning. How the hours dragged—and I pictured to myself Godfrey standing in that narrow space, cramped, half-suffocated, counting the minutes. Yet perhaps he did not find the time so long; perhaps before his eyes some drama was enacting…
One o’clock came at last, and I hurried out and took the Elevated uptown as the quickest way of getting there. It was just one-twenty when I opened my door; with a little shiver of apprehension, I inserted the key in the lock of the closet and threw back the bolt. Godfrey walked out on the instant. He was smiling, but pale with fatigue.
“If you’ve got such a thing as a nip of brandy anywhere about, Lester,” he said, sinking into the nearest chair, “I’d be infinitely obliged for it. I feel rather shaky in the knees.”
I brimmed a glass for him, and he set it down empty, with a sigh of satisfaction.
“That’s better. Do you know, I thought for a time, toward the last, that I was going to collapse. One little crack is scarcely ventilation enough for an active pair of lungs. However, I was repaid.”
“You were?”
“Yes,” and he smiled at my impatience. “I’ll tell you the story, and see what you make of it. First came the chambermaid, who performed her duties with neatness and despatch. Then a dreary half-hour passed. I had about come to the conclusion that I might have spared my pains, when I caught the sound of a key in the lock of the outer door. I heard the door open and close, and an instant later our friend Tremaine appeared within my range of vision.”
“Tremaine!” I exclaimed. “Then he had Thompson’s key!”
“So it seems. Stole it most probably.”
“But why?”
“Ah, if we knew that, we should know everything. I’m glad you didn’t have the lock changed.”
“So am I—it’s added another link to the chain.”
“Yes,” agreed Godfrey, “and a strong one. But my story’s only begun. Tremaine took a look through the rooms to assure himself that there was no one here. He tried the closet door, but didn’t seem surprised or suspicious when he found it locked. Then he went back to the outer room, dropped on his hands and knees and began to search.”
“For the diamond.”
“So I thought, at first. I couldn’t see him for a little while, but presently I perceived that he wasn’t searching over the body of the carpet, but around its edges. He seemed to be looking for a place where it was loose, for he went very slowly from tack to tack. Once I thought he had found it, for he came to a place where a tack was wanting, and ran his hand under eagerly. But in a moment he brought it out again empty.”
“So it couldn’t have been the diamond,” I remarked in perplexity.
“No, it couldn’t have been the diamond,” assented Godfrey, his eyes shining. “But Tremaine wasn’t done yet. Really, he’d make an admirable detective. I admired his methods—though they also gave me a clew to what he was looking for. He placed a chair just here, before this desk, just opposite the bedroom door—you’ll remember that Thompson also had a table and chair similarly placed.”
“Yes, I remember.”
“Then he sat down in the chair and began a minute scrutiny of the walls—first that one yonder—he went over it inch by inch until he came to the speaking-tube. Then he sprang up and opened it and peered inside; even holding a lighted match in—let us see,” and Godfrey also examined the tube. “It’s empty.”
“Yes,” I said. “I’ve used it once or twice, and it works all right.”
“Well, Tremaine wasn’t satisfied with that. He ran his hands along the top ledges of the doors, mounted a chair and peered above the windows—examined every nook and cranny. At last he gave it up, replaced things just as he had found them, glanced at his watch, and went away. Now what was he looking for?”
I cudgelled my brain.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I can’t imagine.”
“Let me help you,” said Godfrey, his eyes shining still more brightly. “I had time to think it all out in the closet there. In the first place, he looked only in the outer room; in the second place, he was plainly looking for something that had been purposely concealed; in the third place, when he examined the room, he placed his chair just where Miss Croydon had sat.”
A flash of light burst upon me.
“The clippings!” I cried.
“The clippings—just that. I haven’t the least doubt of it. And that explains another thing which seemed very puzzling—it explains why Miss Croydon was so anxious to rent this suite. Of course, if she hid the clippings here, she was desperately anxious to recover them, and she’d have got them if Higgins hadn’t been such a superstitious fool.”
Yes, that was plain enough; what had appeared so mysterious was really quite simple, after all. It is so with most mysteries, if one can only see rightly. The trouble is that most of us persist in trying to look beneath the surface instead of examining what is in plain sight. The admirable C. Auguste Dupin was quite right in remarking that truth does not always lie at the bottom of a well.
“But how did he find out about them?” I asked, at last. “Simmonds decided to keep that point to himself, and you have told no one except me.”
“I don’t know—nor how he came to believe they were hidden here.”
“Perhaps Miss Croydon told him,” I suggested. “Perhaps she asked him to get them for her.”
“No, I don’t think so; if she’d done that, she’d have told him where she hid them. I think it much more probable that they contain some secret of his, and he’s concluded she hasn’t got them because she hasn’t produced them against him. And he’s reasoned correctly in supposing that if she hasn’t got them, she must have hidden them here.”
It was a good guess; an adroit one.
“The question is,” added Godfrey, looking about him, “where did she hide them?”
I looked about, too, but I could think of no place which had escaped Tremaine’s scrutiny.
“Perhaps it was in the table she sat before,” said Godfrey, at last. “It must have been some place near at hand, instantly suggesting itself, for Simmonds and I were in the inner room only a minute or two.”
“The table had only a single drawer,” I said, “and I looked through it the night I engaged the rooms. It was empty. I don’t see why Miss Croydon should have concealed the clippings at all; it seems to me that the most natural thing for her to do would be to put them in her pocket.”
“No doubt,” agreed Godfrey; “yet in a moment of excitement like that, the natural thing might be the very last thing she’d think of. Besides, she might have feared that she was to be placed under arrest, and of course she wouldn’t want the clippings to be found on her. But there’s no use sitting here spinning theories. I feel in need of solid refreshment.”
“So do I,” I said, and we went down to the street together.
“By the way,” he added, as we reached the door, “here’s that photograph you asked me for.”
I looked at it, at the coarse, bearded face with its closed eyes—the livid forehead, the full, sensual lips, the heavy, bloated nose. It was not a pleasant sight, but your police photographer does not aim at beauty—he scorns retouching and the other tricks of the trade—he strives only for truth.
“It’s hard to imagine any connection between him and Tremaine,” I remarked.
“Not half so hard as to imagine his connection with Miss Croydon,” commented Godfrey; and I agreed with him.