Arthur Somers Roche

“ What do we care what fools say?” I cried.
“We do care. We must care. Marriage concerns more than husband and wife. There might be—children,” she breathed. “And their mother’s name would be a thing for slanderers to bandy about. ”

“ Miss Gilman at once accepts his statement as proof of his innocence. And so, gentlemen, must we. We know that a cane wedged against the doorknob would make the door, to a gentle, cautious touch, seem locked. We know that a cane could not be placed against the knob in such a fashion as to wedge the door tight, save from the inside of the room. That is elementary knowledge. Minot could not have pushed the door open, shot the major and replaced the cane against the inside of the door. ”

“ Reese,” he said, “with all respect to you, we ain’t goin’ to bring in no such verdict as murder. We don’t believe Miss Gilman done it. And I don’t believe any of us here take much stock in fairies. And only a fairy, or a devil, or somethin’ like that could have murdered Major Penrose. It was an accident.
“You ain’t infallible, doctor, with all respect to you. You say it wasn’t suicide, and you know more about such things than we do. We’ll take your word for it. But when you say it’s murder, and then prove it’s impossible for it to have been a murder—well, we can’t swallow that, doctor. ”

“ And so—though it wasn’t suicide, though it wasn’t accident, though Ruth Gilman was the only one who could have killed her uncle—I know she didn’t. And if I know it, who do not love her but who only remember that I misjudged the. woman I did love—Wrenham, never doubt her. Trust her!”
“To the end,” I said.
“But clear her! The shadow—always over her—she feels it now, poor girl, up-stairs, white, stunned. The shadow will always be there. Wrenham, you’re clever. You created Weatherby Jones. Make him real. Make him solve this problem of real life. ”

“ It didn’t make any difference who fired that shot, or why. I might get mixed up in it some way or other. And that might mean that I’d lose my chance of getting those plans. Don’t ask me why; a man doesn’t do much reasoning at a moment like that.
“I seemed to feel that it was no accident that had discharged the weapon in that room. I sensed death in the report! And death by violence is an ugly thing. I couldn’t be mixed up in it; I couldn’t be held as a witness to murder or suicide and prevented from taking my chance for those plans. ”

“ But you can’t muzzle the press; you can’t hide things from it. Sooner or later it leaks out, and the longer it’s delayed, the more pains you’ve taken to hide it, the worse it seems. Moreover, Penrose was an army man. The papers will want something. I’ll do what I can, but—Wrenham, it’s up to you.”
His manner changed.
“Here are some addresses she sent me. Friends in Washington who’ll take care of that end. She wouldn’t even let me wire yesterday of her uncle’s death, any more than she’d talk about Minot or Ravenell. Duty, her uncle’s honor, came first. ”

“ He turned to his fellow-jurymen.
“Members of this jury,” he said, “do we render a verdict that the late Major Samuel Penrose, U. S. A., retired, came to his death by accidental shooting, or don’t we? If we bring in a verdict of murder against a person unknown, we make people think that this pore little girl did it, and we didn’t have nerve enough to come right out and accuse a lady. Was it an accident?” ”

“ But now—with Miss Gilman’s testimony confronting that theory, we have to discard it. Murderer though Minot may have been at heart, he did not kill Major Penrose. There remains but one other person who was upon that floor.
“Gentlemen, that person is Miss Ruth Gilman. A moment ago, all she had to do, to avert even the breath of suspicion, was say that Minot lied about the door. But you saw her and heard her. You saw how she at once came to Minot’s rescue and saved him with a word. Would a woman who had slain her own uncle do that? ”

“ The jury had already scattered to their homes or the village stores to gossip; Minot and Ravenell had been gruffly ordered out of the hotel by Captain Perkins and had departed.
“How is she?” I demanded of Reese.
“She’ll pull through,” he said. “But some one ought to help her take charge of things—her uncle’s body, you know, all that. He is to be buried in Washington, she told me. ”