Arthur B. Reeve

“ Mrs. Lafferty was agape. Hope tried to slip out. The lithe figure bounded between Hope and the door.
“No, you don't! Not until I've had my say. I've caught you two together. I heard you were coming here. Never mind how. I'm going to put this poor old lady wise. Do you know her, Mrs. Lafferty?” ”

“ Was it to get out of this and the prosecution that would follow that Kinsella had needed five thousand dollars so desperately?
“Louise Lavender must have been a mighty fascinating girl,” observed Kennedy, “with the millionaire, Hartley, on her list, the actor, Halliwell, this white-light sport, Kinsella—enemy husband.”
“That ought to give you something to work on,” supplied Warsky, as we left the newspaper men, “Kinsella, this wise guy, and Hartley, the millionaire philanderer. Either one of them's better than Bert Halliwell to work on, I think.” ”

“ In this group, the cells are agglutinated by the serum of all the other groups, while their serum contains no agglutinin whatever. These groups never change. They are what you might call the 'finger-prints of the blood.'
“As a baby is developed in the embryo,” Kennedy went on, “the specific agglutinability of the red cells, call agglutinogen, appears first and is usually present at birth. The specific agglutinative power of the blood-serum, called agglutinin, which is to characterize the individual through life, may be absent at birth and may not appear for some months.” ”

“ WARSKY looked chidingly at Halliwell. He turned to Kennedy.
“With Bert dragged into this Hartley divorce, and now this Louise Lavender murder, Kennedy, my picture isn't worth a plugged nickel. You know the state of the public mind. Clear Halliwell—I'll make it worth your while—twenty-five per cent. of the picture if you clear him. There!”
Craig had his hand again on the telephone.
“Mrs. Hartley worked in your picture,” he reflected, looking at Warsky.
“Yes. When we were making 'Red Blood and Blue,' which we're just finishing, she wanted to play in it. It's a story of society life. ”

“ Group one is the most numerous. Over forty per cent. of people. And it can never be hybrid. Group two is the next most numerous. Just under forty per cent. It can be hybrid only with regard to its dominant quality. The same is true of group three. About twelve to fifteen per cent. Group four is the rarest. Only two to five per cent. of people.”
“What happens when people marry?” Hartley's voice was a bit shaky.
“I'm coming to that. Unions of men and women from each of these groups give children definitely in groups that can be expected. Union of one and one give only one. ”

“ Kennedy, I didn't come to you about the murder. I asked you to help me prove the legitimacy of Beth. Let others prove other things!”
“But,” urged Craig, “Beth would not want her mother held in a murder. That would hurt her, too. I want to see Beth.”
“Now? She is at home. Come!”
AS WE taxied over to the home of wealth and exquisite taste in the new old Turtle Hill district, I thought of what Lucy had spilled—that Hamlin Hartley knew that his wife had been in Louise's apartment some time that night, that he had picked up a script of the picture with her name on it. ”

“ She came to the city, got into the butterfly life. Her mother wrote me to look Louise up. I did—tried to reform her——”
“And, you know,” interrupted Warsky, “the first thing a man does, they say, when he tries to reform a girl. Well—confound it!—that's more gossip.”
Kennedy had remained with one hand on the telephone-receiver, while in the other he had a pencil with which he was absently scrawling the formula for veronal on a pad by the instrument. Now he took off the receiver, called the district-attorney's office and asked for our friend Dr. Leslie, medical adviser. ”

“ It is the smudge where a forehead has been pressed against the glass, looking in. Did you ever know there is a science of poroscopy, the arrangement of the pores? We can tell, without one failure in a billion, whose forehead that was.” Kennedy regarded the pair standing, with the little girl. “Hope Hartley knew that Canby knew she was there,” he added. “At the same time she feared that Hamlin Hartley might have actually done the murder by accident, to get his letters. Hamlin Hartley knew she had been there. ”

“ Little Beth Hartley is in group two. Therefore Beth Hartley could not be the child of Hope Hartley and Bert Halliwell.”
Hope was leaning forward, wide-eyed. A smile played on Halliwell's face. Kennedy gave no chance for interruption.
“Hamlin Hartley is in group two. Groups one and two produce only one and two. I believe that Beth, in group two, is really the child of Hope and Hamlin Hartley.”
There was a sharp intake of air from Hope. Hamlin stared straight ahead. Kennedy did not pause.
“Louise Lavender was in group one, also,” he pursued. “As we saw, Hamlin Hartley was in group two. ”

“ Marie will have to go for putting such nonsense in your little head. Of course he is.” The big brown eyes, full of mother love, looked up at Craig, with tears just hanging on the beautiful lashes. The low, modulated voice murmured sadly, “Gossip breaks more hearts than death, Mr. Kennedy, causes more misery and trouble.” She straightened. “I'll fight the whole world to protect this child!”
In whispered sentences Hope Hartley admitted the whole story. She had been at Louise's apartment. She had gone there to get Hamlin away. ”

“ According to the theory, Louise had threatened Kinsella with divorce. Then had followed: “You're a second-hand girl,” and Kinsella had told her she couldn't get the divorce—that he would prove in court what she was.
By now the beauty-shop and the apartment were the G.H.Q. of the newspaper detectives, most of whom I knew. Under pretense of letting them interview Kennedy, I got them together so that he could interview them. ”

“ It was of my wife, the baby and Bert Halliwell.'"
Halliwell now spoke up.
“That's when my wife, Lucy Lovett—the dancer, you know—began to sit up and take notice. Lucy's a lady of temper—and temperament—and temperature. She consulted her attorneys the moment my name came into the Hartley case. Then came this murder. The newspapers dug up a story of my intimacy with Louise Lavender. Exhibit Two. Then Lucy sued——”
“Well, what's your story?” asked Craig, with a smile. ”

“ Mr. Hartley has made a statement that he was there until two in the morning, went up accompanied by his man Friday, his attorney, Canby, who says he left about midnight. Her maid found her dead in the morning—from an overdose of veronal, some sleeping-drug. It had been placed in a drink. That's what Dr. Leslie says, anyhow. There were signs of violence about. ”