Johnston McCulley

“ Frake sprang toward her, the others uttered a cry of horror. But Detective Frake was too late. The little vial she held in her hand was emptied down her throat. Frake knew that deadly poison. It was an acid that killed almost as soon as it touched the tongue. Marie Dolge had imposed and paid the penalty.
Frake walked through the hall later with Attorney Garder.
“Matter of fact,” Frake said, “I thought Purden did it. The criminal's sense of guilt is the detective's greatest ally.” ”

“ Let her get over it. Madge is a sensible woman, Purden will make some fool break that will show her just what kind of man he is. Leave it to Madge!”
“She'll marry him—that's what she'll do!” Mrs. Crend declared. “I'm a woman, and I can read the workings of another woman's mind. Don't you suppose that I can see how things are going? She'll marry him—and he'll run through her fortune. We'll not get a cent of it.”
“We haven't a chance, anyway,” Crend assured her. “I'd just drop the whole thing.”
“She is my sister, and I want to save her, aside from any thoughts of the money.” ”

“ Marie Dolge and Peter Podd sat apart from the others, evidently feeling highly uncomfortable. Mr. and Mrs. Crend were on a divan in a corner, the latter weeping softly. Madison Purden sat aloof, and Attorney Garder was in another corner acting like an interested man awaiting developments.
Frake sat down and looked them over.
“Well, you have heard one another questioned,” he said. “But there are some queer things that you do not know, and which I am going to relate to you. It is these queer things that decided us it might be a case of murder rather than suicide. ”

“ But Purden, seemingly bewildered, only sat down near one of the windows and pretended not to notice the hostility his presence aroused.
Thus Detective Frake had kept them waiting for a time, while he held a whispered conversation in the hall outside with the doctor. Another and a closer investigation had been made in the room of tragedy, and the body was to be removed. A finger-print man from headquarters had taken the prints of those who had waited in the vacant apartment. Some of them had been frightened a little; in their minds they coupled finger prints with guilt. ”

“ Mrs. Crend hesitated. “I suppose it would be better to tell you the truth,” she said.
“It'll save time,” said Frake. “I'd get at it somehow, anyway.”
“Well, my sister has been receiving the attentions of a certain man, of whom my husband and I do not approve,” said Mrs. Crend. “I thought her message meant that she was going to elope with him. So we hurried right over to make an effort to stop her.”
“Um!” Frake grunted. “Who is the man?”
“Madison Purden.”
“I know of him,” said Detective Frake. “So you did not approve of him?”
“No, we did not,” Mrs. Crend replied. ”

“ Marie Dolge stepped through the door and hurried along the alley toward the nearest street. Peter Podd looked after her. A fine girl, she was, but peculiar and mysterious at times! Foreign blood in her, Peter Podd had decided long before. A girl who could take her own part with anybody! Not a spineless old creature without any aggression, like Podd! ”

“ The superintendent of the apartment house arrived at that moment. He seemed glad to find a man like Attorney Garder in charge of matters. He knew that Garder was a man of broad experience, and that there would be as little fuss as possible. A first-class apartment house or hotel does not like to advertise its tragedies.
The superintendent hurried down the stairs again, to lay in wait for the coroner and police and get them into the apartment without attracting too much attention. They arrived within a few minutes, Attorney Garder's telephone messages having had that effect. ”

“ She is the sort that always dodges accidents.”
“That man, Madison Purden, has infatuated her,” Mrs. Crend declared. “He began to attract her before Lennek had been dead a month. He played on her sympathy. She'll not listen to me any more. I told her the truth about Madison Purden—that he's a schemer and a scoundrel, and that decent men won't have anything at all to do with him. And she told me to attend to my own business, that she was capable of picking her friends without any outside assistance. Outside assistance! Her own sister!” ”

“ Attorney Garder wanted to know. “How could a dead person telephone? Is there such a thing as a ghost message? The thing is ridiculous. In my opinion, Mrs. Lennek telephoned from her boudoir at half past three, to Mrs. Crend and to me, the telephone switchboard girl to the contrary notwithstanding! I've known telephone girls who didn't have their minds on their work continually.” ”

“ Lennek must have been dead before half past three?” Detective Frake asked.
“With all due respect, to the profession and the individual mentioned, physicians make mistakes now and then,” Attorney Garder said. “I'm a lawyer. I've seen two eminent physicians get up in court and dispute each other as to some pertinent fact in the testimony. Poison does not act the same on all persons.” ”

“ The finger-print man now was working in the boudoir, and Detective Sam Frake was waiting for his report.
“You've got a tough proposition, Frake,” the coroner's assistant said.
“I know it,” Sam Frake replied. “But I'm working on their nerves, and that will help bring out the truth. I'm keeping all of them in that room. They are persons in different planes of society, and all of them are uncomfortable. They are in an atmosphere of crime and mystery. We've got a high-brow in the department who would talk about psychology—but I call it making 'em nervous and getting their goats. ”

“ Do I look so bad?”
“Your face looks rather pale. I hate to see a pretty girl like you feeling bad. It's not natural.”
“I don't work at the pleasantest place in town,” said Marie. “I'm going to leave Mrs. Lennek as soon as I can get another good place. She's not human at times.”
“Cranky?”
“Yes. And she's unfair, too. She tried to get me to give up this afternoon off, and there wasn't a bit of sense in it. I told her that I had an engagement, and I just dressed and came away.”
“And I'm sure glad that you did,” said Benny Ranley. “Now it is up to you, girl, what we do with the afternoon. ”

“ Garder notified the clerk in the office below and then telephoned the coroner and police headquarters. And then he went back to the living room and sat down before the Crends.
“This is indeed terrible,” he said. “I cannot understand it at all. I saw Mrs. Lennek yesterday morning on business—she called at my office downtown—and at that time she was looking into the future, making certain plans about some of her property. She certainly did not act like a person about to commit suicide.”
“Something terrible must have happened,” Mrs. Crend replied. “Her telephone message to me was very peculiar. ”

“ I was afraid the body would be found too quick, you see.
“I called his attention to the clock, that it was three, and then I hurried away. I went right downtown to the drug store, as I said. There I went into a telephone booth, and telephoned to Mrs. Crend and to Mr. Garder. I tried to say things that would make them think I was Mrs. Lennek and intended to commit suicide.
“When I came out, I went to the soda fountain. Benny Ranley met me there, and I mentioned that he was five minutes late. I had everything fixed! I went riding with Benny and spent the afternoon in the country. ”

“ I am a strong girl, and she couldn't fight me off. I pulled her head back, opened her mouth, and poured the poison into it. I pressed her throat and made her swallow, and then choked her so she couldn't cry out. And then I pulled her back and across the end of the divan.
“I suppose I choked her hard, if I left marks. I saw that she was dying, and so I went to the chest of drawers in the corner, and looked through it. I wanted to see if there were any of Mr. Purden's letters there, and get them. I was afraid the papers would print the letters, and my friends would laugh at me. ”

“ Lennek.”
“Terror, is she? She doesn't look it.”
“Huh! You never can tell by a woman's looks how she treats her servants,” Marie declared. “You know old Peter Podd?”
“Sure!”
“She complained about him—and for nothing at all, I'm sure. And Peter Podd is going to lose his job. She's not human sometimes, I tell you. I—I hate her!”
“Poor old Podd!” Ranley exclaimed.
“I met him in the hall as I came away. ”

“ You have kept me waiting.”
“Blame the traffic cop who held me up at a corner,” Benny Ranley said, laughing again. “Let me pay for that soda now, and then we'll hop into the car and drive out into the country, where there aren't any traffic cops.”
The young soda dispenser sighed as he watched them go out to the street. He decided to quit his present job and become a chauffeur. Now and then a chauffeur, it appeared, had a chance to take a girl riding and go out into the country where there were no traffic cops. ”

“ A man's got his livin' to make. I'll see her and tell her so. And I'll ask her to change her mind and do the right thing. If she don't——”
He turned and looked toward the stairs again, If he went up just one short flight, he would be on the floor where Mrs. Madge Lennek had her expensive apartment. If he knocked at the door, the maid would answer.
Peter Podd liked the maid. She was about twenty-five, big and strong, and her eyes flashed in a way that said she could take care of herself. Marie Dolge had been with Mrs. Madge Lennek almost a year, so she had said. ”

“ If she marries Madison Purden, we'll not get a cent of it.”
“Seems to me you're shooting rather wild,” Crend observed. “Madge is a bit younger than you and is in excellent health. The chances are that she'll outlive you by ten years or more.”
“Accidents may happen,” Mrs. Crend reminded him. “A person can never tell.” ”

“ I like to rest when I get a chance.”
“You're my style, girl. Most girls would want to go to some amusement park and dance their heads off. Of course, I stand ready to take you some place like that, if you want to change your mind.” ”

“ He stood up and glanced quickly around the room. Mrs. Lennek's desk, which stood in a corner against the wall, was in disorder. Everything else seemed to be as usual.
Attorney Garder hurried back to the hall door and beckoned the Crends inside.
“This is an emergency where we must control our grief for a time,” he said, “in order to bring our minds to bear on the problem and serve the best interests of all. The coroner and the police will have to be notified, of course. Sit down, please, and I'll telephone down to the office.”
The Crends sat down. Mrs. Crend began weeping softly. ”

“ There were windows open in the living room, and that would cause a draft through the hall.”
“Um!” Detective Frake grunted. “Is it possible that some one might have been hiding in the apartment; and, as soon as you had gone, came, out, committed the crime and then hurried away, neglecting to close the hall door?”
“It—I suppose it would have been possible, sir. But there would be no place to hide except in a closet or under the divan in the boudoir. And how could the person have got in, in the first place?”
“But what about those telephone messages?” ”

“ He was thinking of asking her to tell the superintendent to let him stay. But I told him she was having a fit of temper and to stay away from her until she cooled off. I hope he did!”
Benny Ranley drove on along the tree-bordered country road, intent upon reaching his destination, and Marie Dolge leaned back against the cushions and thought of Peter Podd.
Podd had been undergoing a mental struggle. After Marie Dolge had gone down the alley, Podd had watched the rear stairs, and half a dozen times he had been on the verge of going up to the Lennek apartment and presenting his case. ”

“ I'm to meet Benny downtown, and go for a ride.”
“He's a likable lad,” Peter Podd admitted. “If I was young and strong like Benny Rantey——”
“Don't worry so much, Wait until she gets over her spell of temper and then go see her. Tell her just how it is. You've got to keep your job, course. ”

“ I've worked like a dog all my life, and six months ago I managed to get this janitor's job. It's downright easy compared to the work I'd been doin'. And now I'm goin' to lose it.”
“Lose it?” the girl said. ”

“ Crend?”
“I—I thought it would look bad.”
“It is better to tell the truth, you see. We have ways of knowing when a person does not. That is our business. Mrs. Lennek's maid has told us that, as far as she knew, her mistress did not expect any callers this afternoon, and when she left the boudoir it was not disarranged in any way. But when I arrived, I found that the desk had been ransacked, and also a chest of drawers in a corner.” ”