Mrs. Wilson Woodrow

“ Coombs nodded indifferently. Indeed, his mouth was too full to do much more, and evidently he regarded it as better employed than a discussion either of his disabilities or his talents. The meal consequently progressed almost entirely in silence, until at last the coffee appeared; and then, availing himself of Wallace's cigarettes, he became more loquacious.
“First real food I've had in quite a while,” he observed thoughtfully. “Had a long streak of bad luck—bad luck all around.”
“Well,” smiled Ramsey, “the only sure thing about luck, they say, is that it is bound to change. ”

“ If the attitude of the district attorney's Office is what you tell me, I have no doubt that the letters can be successfully suppressed. But as to securing an acquittal for this valet of yours, that is a horse of another color. The circumstantial evidence—the best evidence in the world, by the way, lay opinion to the contrary notwithstanding—seems all against him. The one thing in his favor is the apparent lack of motive.”
“And isn't that enough?” demanded Ramsey. “Why should he kill a woman utterly unknown to him, and do it in such a manner that there was no chance of escape?” ”

“ Don't let yourself get down-hearted for a minute, Coombs. I got you into this scrape, and I'm going to get you out. You shall have the best counsel that I can secure, and not a stone will be left unturned to establish your complete innocence.”
He turned to his friend from the district attorney's office. “Who is the best criminal lawyer to be had?” he asked.
“The best? Why, Heywood Achison of course, if you can get him. He stands head and shoulders above any other man I could mention.”
“No!” Ramsey's brow darkened, as he demurred to the suggestion. ”

“ That dislocation is an old contortionist trick that I learned years ago, and fortunately Coombs had the nerve to hold his arm that way throughout the months before his trial and so deceive the experts.
“And now that that's settled,” he leaned blandly across the table, “I hope, my young friend, you will begin to see the folly and futility of the absurd suspicions you harbor against me, and abandon these efforts to 'bring me to justice.' If you don't—!” The light satiric smile was still on his lips, but in his eye there was a hint of darker menace. ”

“ He was too young to have acquired the art of which the lawyer was master, that of concealing his feelings.
“Yes” he said shortly; “I've managed to bang up my knee. That's an unimportant thing in itself, but it's had some pretty serious and widespread consequences. You may not have heard of the murder which occurred this evening?”
“Murder?” repeated Achison in his deep tones. “Who was murdered?”
“Ella Sands. She was stabbed in a drug-store over on the West Side, and my man, Coombs, has been arrested for it. He went to meet her in my stead, after I had slipped on a bit of banana peel.” ”

“ Coombs' tone was almost urgently persuasive. “Half the time the people down at the apartment house don't know which of us is which; the hall-boys are forever calling me Mr. Ramsey. It's the clothes and the general resemblance; and then, if I do say it myself, sir, I have caught quite your air. Where were you to meet this woman?” he added.
Ramsey gave a street number not more than a dozen blocks distant from where they were.
It's a drug-store,” he explained, “and I am to wait for her beside a revolving bookcase which contains the circulating library. ”

“ He sighed and shook his head. “Such obsessions are dangerous. They should be resolutely excluded from the mind,”
“I am well aware that my knowledge is dangerous,” Ramsey answered significantly; his face was paler than ever, his eyes were burning. “I have had satisfying proof of that on several occasions. But it is not my peril that is bothers me now; it is that of Coombs. ”

“ His client must be regarded as an innocent man until proven guilty.
“But I shall not stand on that provision of the law.” He flung back his leonine head, and his voice rang out over the courtroom. “I shall show you beyond question that my client never struck the blow that killed Ella Sands.”
Then he called Ramsey to the stand, and skillfully led by Achison, Ramsey told how Coombs at the risk of his own life had saved him at the time of the accident in the subway, and in their subsequent association had always shown himself steady, sober and honest as well as cheerful and efficient. ”

“ You don't act without a motive. What is it in this case?”
Achison smiled with an expression which suggested that the joke was on his companion.
“Ramsey,” he said, “you've seen me do my mystifying act before my audience in the courtroom; now it amuses me to take you behind the scenes and show you just how the rabbits and the bowl of goldfish got into the silk hat.
“My young friend, the argument I put over, that this crime was committed by some unknown man who drove away in an automobile, and who, you are convinced, was hired by a 'Master Mind,' amounts to just that.” ”

“ He did not intend to kill her in the drug-store. He says he did not intend to kill her at all; he merely wanted to talk to her. But when he made himself known—for with his hat drawn down, she doubtless believed him to be you until after the interchange of the letters and money had been accomplished—she snatched the knife out of her bag, he claims, and made a lunge at him. He wrested the knife from her hand, and then as she turned to flee, he reached over her shoulder and struck her down. In the eyes of the law, Coombs stands an innocent man ”

“ THEN Achison introduced into the case one of those surprise features for which he was famous. He called to the stand a solid, well-dressed man of the substantial citizen type who proved to be the head of an important manufacturing concern. This witness stated that on the evening of the murder he had left his home about seven o'clock, and, while walking up the hill toward the corner occupied by the drug-store, had seen a man who was standing just outside the side entrance of the place, turn suddenly, dash across the sidewalk, jump into a motorcar standing at the curb, and drive hurriedly away. ”

“ Wallace looked dubious. “I've scraped along without one so far. You see, although I'm living now in bachelor apartment, I travel a good deal, and I've learned to do pretty well for myself. To tell the truth, I'm afraid you wouldn't have enough to occupy you.”
“I think I could make myself useful,” urged Coombs “I'm a pretty good cook too—nothing fancy, you know; but I could please you, I'm sure. I could also,” with that half-impudent (illegible text) of his eyes, “wear any half-worn clothes you have. We are enough of a size to be twins.”
“I've noticed that too,” said Ramsey. ”

“ My life may be worthless enough to others, but it's distinctly valuable to me, and since you've saved it, I want you to let me—”
He reached for his bill-fold, but Coombs stretched a deprecating hand across the table.
“No need of that, Mr. Ramsey,” he protested. “If you give me money,” twitching his nose whimsically, “it would be a roundabout way of presenting it to a lot of poker sharks and hard-book men. I'd rather keep fit, and earn it. I want to keep it.” His face became serious, even dark for a moment. “And I'm not a bad valet ”

“ He blew out a cloud of cigarette smoke, and watched it dissipate into the air.
“You don't believe me, eh? He turned his broad, mocking face back to Ramsey. “You think I am drawing a red herring across the trail, because I realize where it really leads? Let me see; how shall I convince you? Like all doubters, you demand a sign, yet fail to perceive those which lie right under your nose.
“How do you suppose, for instance, that I secured as a witness that eminently respectable manufacturer who served as the corner stone of my defense? Was it by chance? A stroke of luck? Not at all. ”

“ Ramsey noticed, though, after the soup was finished and a thick, juicy steak which followed had been served, that Coombs winced in attempting to manipulate his portion, and transferred his knife from his right hand to his left.
“Twisted my elbow a bit back there in the subway,” he explained in response to the other's inquiring glance, but scoffed when Ramsey urged him to see a doctor. “It's nothing,” he demurred; “get well by itself in no time. ”

“ He came to this country seeking her, and—”
“And of course arranged it so that I should sprain my knee,” sneered Ramsey, “and he go to the appointment in my place; probably laid the banana peel purposely in my path. Don't you think you are stretching the long arm of coincidence a little far?”
“When you sprained your knee,” returned Achison, “and Coombs appeared so opportunely on the scene, he was not playing the protective watchdog as you so fondly imagined. He was following you to get in touch with Ella Sands after your interview was over. A man has no secrets from his valet, remember. ”

“ Involuntarily he cast a quick look about him as the other man had done, then jerked his head toward a taxi standing at the curb.
“Let's get out of this,” he said. “I had an engagement for dinner, but don't feel in the mood to keep it now. And you offered to see me on my way. Suppose, if you've nothing else on hand, that we dine together tonight; then we can talk things over at our leisure. My name is Ramsey, by the way, Wallace Ramsey.”
“Mine's Coombs,” returned the other. “And 'dine' sounds good to me.” ”

“ Meanwhile, she was actually afraid to walk the streets. After her telephone conversation with you that day, she spent the whole of the rest of the afternoon in my office rather than go back home; and she became so nervous and apprehensive as the time approached to set out for her appointment, that I sent her to the drug-store in my car, and gave my chauffeur orders to wait and drive her to Grand Central Station, for she was planning to leave the city at once. It was he who was seen by the manufacturer, and mine the mysterious car in which he drove away. ”

“ The bookcase holding the thumbed and limp volumes of the circulating library was, he saw, on the right side of the store and directly opposite the side entrance. He also observed that the windows being below the level of the sidewalk, it was impossible for passers-by to see what was going on inside. ”

“ To substantiate this assumption, he had a dummy brought into court, and then calling a team of professional knife-throwers furnished by one of the theatrical agencies, he stationed them at exactly the distance the woman had been from the door, and then directed one of them to drive a knife into the dummy's supposititious heart. ”

“ A moment later he saw the crowd commencing to gather, and when he reached the corner, learned that a murder had been committed.
Asked why he had not reported this before, he replied that he had attached no importance to the circumstance. He was told when he reached the corner that the murderer had been captured, and this was confirmed by the account in the next morning's papers. ”

“ She told me that she was no longer young and felt that she ought to establish herself in a settled position. Her brother, she said, a successful truck-farmer, would buy more land and take her in as a partner, if she could furnish the required capital. She thought then of the letters, and knowing that you had been seeking to locate her, looked to you as a likely purchaser.
“I told her if she could give me proof that you were the person buying them, she could have the letters; and accordingly, the telephone conversation you had with her ”