Agatha Webb, Anna Katharine Green [readnow TXT] 📗

upon a blow given by a small, three-sided, slender blade; the younger from a stroke of apoplexy, induced by fright.”

“Good! I am glad to hear my instincts were not at fault. Loss of blood, eh? Death, then, was not instantaneous?”

“No.”

“Strange!” fell from the lips of his two listeners. “She lived, yet gave no alarm.”

“None that was heard,” suggested the young doctor, who was from another town.

“Or, if heard, reached no ears but Philemon’s,” observed the constable. “Something must have taken him upstairs.”

“I am not so sure,” said the coroner, “that Philemon is not answerable for the whole crime, notwithstanding our failure to find the missing money anywhere in the house. How else account for the resignation with which she evidently met her death? Had a stranger struck her, Agatha Webb would have struggled. There is no sign of struggle in the room.”

“She would have struggled against Philemon had she had strength to struggle. I think she was asleep when she was struck.”

“Ah! And was not standing by the table? How about the blood there, then?”

“Shaken from the murderer’s fingers in fright or disgust.”

“There was no blood on Philemon’s fingers.”

“No; he wiped them on his sleeve.”

“If he was the one to use the dagger against her, where is the dagger? Should we not be able to find it somewhere about the premises?”

“He may have buried it outside. Crazy men are super naturally cunning.”

“When you can produce it from any place inside that board fence, I will consider your theory. At present I limit my suspicions of Philemon to the half-unconscious attentions which a man of disordered intellect might give a wife bleeding and dying under his eyes. My idea on the subject is–”

“Would you be so kind as not to give utterance to your ideas until I have been able to form some for myself?” interrupted a voice from the doorway.

As this voice was unexpected, they all turned. A small man with sleek dark hair and expressionless features stood before them. Behind him was Abel, carrying a hand-bag and umbrella.

“The detective from Boston,” announced the latter. Coroner Talbot rose.

“You are in good time,” he remarked. “We have work of no ordinary nature for you.”

The man failed to look interested. But then his countenance was not one to show emotion.

“My name is Knapp,” said he. “I have had my supper, and am ready to go to work. I have read the newspapers; all I want now is any additional facts that have come to light since the telegraphic dispatches were sent to Boston. Facts, mind you; not theories. I never allow myself to be hampered by other persons’ theories.”

Not liking his manner, which was brusque and too self-important for a man of such insignificant appearance, Coroner Talbot referred him to Mr. Fenton, who immediately proceeded to give him the result of such investigations as he and his men had been able to make; which done, Mr. Knapp put on his hat and turned toward the door.

“I will go to the house and see for myself what is to be learned there,” said he. “May I ask the privilege of going alone?” he added, as Mr. Fenton moved. “Abel will see that I am given admittance.”

“Show me your credentials,” said the coroner. He did so. “They seem all right, and you should be a man who understands his business. Go alone, if you prefer, but bring your conclusions here. They may need some correcting.”

“Oh, I will return,” Knapp nonchalantly remarked, and went out, having made anything but a favourable impression upon the assembled gentlemen.

“I wish we had shown more grit and tried to handle this thing ourselves,” observed Mr. Fenton. “I cannot bear to think of that cold, bloodless creature hovering over our beloved Agatha.”

“I wonder at Carson. Why should he send us such a man? Could he not see the matter demanded extraordinary skill and judgment?”

“Oh, this fellow may have skill. But he is so unpleasant. I hate to deal with folks of such fish-like characteristics. But who is this?” he asked as a gentle tap was heard at the door. “Why, it’s Loton. What can he want here?”

The man whose presence in the doorway had called out this exclamation started at the sound of the doctor’s heavy voice, and came very hesitatingly forward. He was of a weak, irritable type, and seemed to be in a state of great excitement.

“I beg pardon,” said he, “for showing myself. I don’t like to intrude into such company, but I have something to tell you which may be of use, sirs, though it isn’t any great thing, either.”

“Something about the murder which has taken place?” asked the coroner, in a milder tone. He knew Loton well, and realised the advisability of encouragement in his case.

“The murder! Oh, I wouldn’t presume to say anything about the murder. I’m not the man to stir up any such subject as that. It’s about the money—or some money—more money than usually falls into my till. It—it was rather queer, sirs, and I have felt the flutter of it all day. Shall I tell you about it? It happened last night, late last night, sirs, so late that I was in bed with my wife, and had been snoring, she said, four hours.”

“What money? New money? Crisp, fresh bills, Loton?” eagerly questioned Mr. Fenton.

Loton, who was the keeper of a small confectionery and bakery store on one of the side streets leading up the hill, shifted uneasily between his two interrogators, and finally addressed himself to the coroner:

“It was new money. I thought it felt so at night, but I was sure of it in the morning. A brand-new bill, sir, a—But that isn’t the queerest thing about it. I was asleep, sir, sound asleep, and dreaming of my courting days (for I asked Sally at the circus, sirs, and the band playing on the hill made me think of it), when I was suddenly shook awake by Sally herself, who says she hadn’t slept a wink for listening to the music and wishing she was a girl again. ‘There’s a man at the shop door,’ cries she. ‘He’s a-calling of you; go and see what he wants.’ I was mad at being wakened. Dreaming is pleasant, specially when clowns and kissing get mixed up in it, but duty is duty, and so into the shop I stumbled, swearing a bit perhaps, for I hadn’t stopped for a light and it was as dark as double shutters could make it. The hammering had become deafening. No let up till I reached the door, when it suddenly ceased.

“‘What is it?’ I cried. ‘Who’s there and what do you want?’

“A trembling voice answered me. ‘Let me in,’ it said. ‘I want to buy something to eat. For God’s sake, open the door!’

“I don’t know why I obeyed, for it was late, and I did not know the voice, but something in the impatient rattling of the door which accompanied the words affected me in spite of myself, and I slowly opened my shop to this midnight customer.

“‘You must be hungry,’ I began. But the person who had crowded in as soon as the opening was large enough wouldn’t let me finish.

“‘Bread! I want bread, or crackers, or anything that you can find easiest,’ he gasped, like a man who had been running. ‘Here’s money’; and he poked into my hand a bill so stiff that it rattled. ‘It’s more than enough,’ he hastened to say, as I hesitated over it, ‘but never mind that; I’ll come for the change in the morning.’

“‘Who are you? I cried. ‘You are not Blind Willy, I’m sure.’

“But his only answer was ‘Bread!’ while he leaned so hard against the counter I felt it shake.

“I could not stand that cry of ‘Bread!’ so I groped about in the dark, and found him a stale loaf, which I put into his arms, with a short, ‘There! Now tell me what your name is.’

“But at this he seemed to shrink into himself; and muttering something that might pass for thanks, he stumbled towards the door and rushed hastily out. Running after him, I listened eagerly to his steps. They went up the hill.”

“And the money? What about the money?” asked the coroner. “Didn’t he come back for the change?”

“No. I put it in the till, thinking it was a dollar bill. But when I came to look at it in the morning, it was a twenty; yes, sirs, a twenty!”

This was startling. The coroner and the constable looked at each other before looking again at him.

“And where is that bill now?” asked the former. “Have you brought it with you?”

“I have, sir. It’s been in and out of the till twenty times to-day. I haven’t known what to do with it. I don’t like to think wrong of anybody, but when I heard that Mrs. Webb (God bless her!) was murdered last night for money, I couldn’t rest for the weight of this thing on my conscience. Here’s the bill, sir. I wish I had let the old man rap on my door till morning before I had taken it from him.”

They did not share this feeling. A distinct and valuable clew seemed to be afforded them by the fresh, crisp bill they saw in his hand. Silently Dr. Talbot took it, while Mr. Fenton, with a shrewd look, asked:

“What reasons have you for calling this mysterious customer old? I thought it was so dark you could not see him.”

The man, who looked relieved since he had rid himself of the bill, eyed the constable in some perplexity.

“I didn’t see a feature of his face,” said he, “and yet I’m sure he was old. I never thought of him as being anything else.”

“Well, we will see. And is that all you have to tell us?”

His nod was expressive, and they let him go.

An hour or so later Detective Knapp made his reappearance.

“Well,” asked the coroner, as he came quietly in and closed the door behind him, “what’s your opinion?”

“Simple case, sir. Murdered for money. Find the man with a flowing beard.”

XI THE MAN WITH A BEARD

There were but few men in town who wore long beards. A list was made of these and handed to the coroner, who regarded it with a grim smile.

“Not a man whose name is here would be guilty of a misdemeanour, let alone a crime. You must look outside of our village population for the murderer of Agatha Webb.”

“Very likely, but tell me something first about these persons,” urged Knapp. “Who is Edward Hope?”

“A watch repairer; a man of estimable character.”

“And Sylvester Chubb?”

“A farmer who, to support his mother, wife, and seven children, works from morning till sundown on his farm, and from sundown till 11 o’clock at night on little fancy articles he cuts out from wood and sells in Boston.”

“John Barker, Thomas Elder, Timothy Sinn?”

“All good men; I can vouch for every one of them.”

“And John Zabel, James Zabel?”

“Irreproachable, both of them. Famous shipbuilders once, but the change to iron shipbuilding has thrown them out of business. Pity, too, for they were remarkable builders. By the by, Fenton, we don’t see them at church or on the docks any more.”

“No, they keep very much to themselves; getting old, like ourselves, Talbot.”

“Lively boys once. We must hunt them up, Fenton. Can’t bear to see old friends drop away from good company. But this isn’t business. You need not pause over their names, Knapp.”

But Knapp had slipped out.

We will follow him.

Walking briskly down the street, he went up the