Samuel Hopkins Adams

“ In the foreground a corpse, the face bent far up and back from the spar to which it was lashed, rode with wild abandon headlong at the onlooker, on the crest of a roaring surge. The rest was infinite clarity of distance and desolation.
“The Rough Rider!” murmured Kent; then, with a change of tone, “For sale?”
“I don’t know,” hesitated the artist. “Fact is, I like that about well enough to keep.”
“I’ll give you five hundred dollars for it.”
“Five hundred! Man alive! A hundred is the most I’ve ever got for any of my prints!” ”

“ Blair’s arm rose, steady and slow, with the inevitable motion of machinery.
“If you shoot,” pointed out Kent, “you will rouse the house. Is there no one there from whom you wish to conceal that coffin?”
The arm rose higher until the muzzle of the pistol glared, like a baleful lusterless eye, into Kent’s face. Instead of making any counter-motion with the sheriff’s revolver, the scientist turned on his heel, walked to Sedgwick, and handed him the weapon. “I’m going to open the coffin, Frank,” he announced. “That pistol of Mr. Blair’s is a target arm. It has only one shot.” ”

“ Of Alexander Blair himself, nothing had been seen in the neighborhood since mid-July, nor of his daughter-in-law. Hedgerow House was in charge of Gansett Jim as caretaker. Professor Kent had left about the same time as the Blairs. But Francis Sedgwick had stuck to the Nook, studying first the cold grays and browns of November, and later the wonderful blazing whites and subtle blues of drift and shadow spread before him in winter’s endless panorama, with the same enthusiasm that he had devoted to October’s riot of color. Though the work prospered, the worker had paled. ”

“ Relief clamored within Sedgwick for expression. He began to laugh in short choking spasms.
“Quiet!” warned Mr. Blair, in a broken tone of appeal. “You’ve found out the secret. God knows what you’ll do with it. But there are innocent people in the house. I see a light stirring there now. We—I must do what I may to shelter them.”
A glimmer shone from the ground floor of one of the wings. Thither Mr. Blair ran, calling out as he went. When he returned, his face was like a mask.
“Now,” said he, “what is this matter? Blackmail?”
Kent’s face withdrew, as it were, behind his inscrutable half smile. ”

“ Sheriff Schlager half rose from his chair. “Ain’t you told ’em, Professor Kent?”
Kent shook his head.
“Nor you, Mr. Blair?”
“No.”
“Then I don’t see why we can’t keep it amongst ourselves,” said the sheriff. “Gansett Jim’s tight as a clam. Nobody’ll ever get anything out of him. And, Lord knows, the less that’s known of it the better I’m suited. I ain’t none too proud of my part in it.”
“There is no reason why it should ever be known outside of this room,” said Kent, and, at the words, Alexander Blair exhaled a pent-up breath of relief. ”

“ She glanced at Professor Kent, and, to her surprise, found him exhibiting every evidence of discomposure. He fidgeted, fanned himself with his hat, mopped his brow and palpably flinched under the solemn regard of the mage.
“Stupid of me,” he muttered, in apology. “Gets on one’s nerves, you know. Awesome, and all that sort of thing, fussing with the stars.”
Preston Jax bestowed a patronizing smile upon his visitor. Protectiveness, benign and assured, radiated from him.
“Fear nothing,” said he. “The star forces respond to the master-will of him who comprehends them. ”

“ There was silence for nearly half an hour, while the car slipped, ghostlike, along the wet roadway. Presently it turned aside and stopped.
“Foot work now,” said Kent. “Take the spades and follow.”
He himself, leading the way, carried a coil of rope on his shoulders. For what Sedgwick reckoned to be half a mile they wallowed across soaked meadows, until the whisper of rain upon water came to his ears. ”

“ Amateurs who have wholly dropped a subject since years back don’t usually know publications issued only within three months. That casual meeting with me was well carried out, and you called it chance. A very palpably manufactured chance! But why am I worth so much trouble to know? And why does Alexander Blair leave a desperately ill son to arrange an errand for me at this particular time? And is Hedgerow House, fourteen miles distant and possessing just such an electric car as a woman would use in driving round the country, perhaps the place whence came Sedgwick’s sweet lady of mystery? ”

“ She was, from the evidence of the Grosvenor family historian, who, by the way, has withheld all this from his pages, a woman of the most extraordinary charm and magnetism. Not beautiful, in the strict sense of the word, she had a gift beyond beauty, and she led men in chains. Her husband appears to have been a weakling who counted for nothing in her life after the birth of her children. Seeking distraction, she flung herself into mysticism and became the priestess of a cult of star-worshipers, which included many of the more cultivated people of this region. ”

“ Sound as was his condition, Sedgwick was panting when he brought up at the spot, some yards behind his long-limbed leader. As the scientist had surmised, the arrangement of coat and cap in the studio presented, at that distance, an excellent simulacrum of the rear view of a man lounging in a chair. Bidding the artist stay outside the copse, Kent entered on hands and knees and made extended exploration. After a few moments the sound of low lugubrious whistling was heard from the trees, and presently the musician emerged leading himself by the lobe of his ear. ”

“ The tennis match seemed to have sweated the megrims out of him. He regaled his chafing friend with anecdotes from his varied career; the comedy of the dynamiter’s hair; the tragedy of the thrice fatal telephone message at the Standard Club; the drama of the orchid hunt on Weehawken Heights. From time to time he thrust a hand out of the window. Shortly after midnight there was a splatter of rain on the roof.
“Good!” said Kent, stretching elaborately. “Couldn’t be better. Life’s a fine sport!”
“Couldn’t be worse, I should think,” contradicted Sedgwick. ”

“ He pulled and pulled, until, as if by that process, he had turned his face toward the cliff. His lips pursed. He began whistling softly, and tunelessly. His gaze was abstracted.
“Ain’t seen nothin’ to make you feel bad, have you, Perfessor?” inquired Temporary-Deputy-Sheriff Jarvis with some acerbity.
“Eh? What?” said Kent absently. “Seen anything? Nothing but what’s there for any one to see.”
Following his fixed gaze, the others studied the face of the cliff; all but Sailor Smith. He blinked near-sightedly at the corpse. ”

“ Sedgwick turned very white. “Do you mean that she is a married woman?” he demanded.
“How could you have failed to see it?” returned the other gently.
“But what is there to prove it?”
“Proof? None. Indication, plenty. Her visits, in the first place. A young girl of breeding and social experience would hardly have come to your studio. A married woman might, who respected herself with full confidence, and knew, with the same confidence, that you would respect her. And, my dear boy,” added Kent, with his quiet winning smile, “you are a man to inspire confidence. ”

“ Six men carried the coffin. They were all strangers to Kent, and their clothes gave obvious testimony of city origin. Half a dozen other men, and three women, heavily veiled, followed. Kent thrust his glass into his pocket and lifted his rod again. By the time the clergyman had begun the service Kent was close to the obstructing fence. He could hear the faint solemn murmur of the words. Then came the lowering of the casket. The onlooker marked the black and silver sumptuousness of it, and thought of the rough hemlock box that enclosed the anonymous body in Annalaka churchyard. ”

“ Sailor Smith, sturdy and white, entered and greeted Kent courteously.
“Mr. Dennett was saying,” remarked Kent, “that you know something of the history of Hedgerow House, as I believe they call it.”
“They call it!” repeated the old sailor. “Who calls it? If you mean the Blair place, that’s Hogg’s Haven, that is! You can’t wipe out that name while there’s a man living as knew the place at its worst. Old Captain Hogg built it and lived in it and died in it. And if there’s a fryin’-pan in hell, the devil is fryin’ bacon out of old Hogg to-day for the things he done in that house.” ”

“ Marjorie is one of those rare human beings who deal honestly with themselves. Her husband’s death can be nothing but a welcome release. She feels no grief; she will pretend to none. Not even to herself. I will take you to her to-morrow.”
“Blair ill-treated her?” asked Kent.
“Oh, ill-treatment! That is a wide term. I believe that the poor weakling did his best to keep faith and honor. But ropes of mud are strong. ”

“ The cry, he thought, was in a man’s voice. Simon P. Groot isn’t wholly lacking in sense of observation.”
“A man’s voice in a cry? What could that mean?”
“Oh, any one of several hundred unthinkable things,” said Kent patiently.
“Wait! She must have attacked some other man, as she did me. She was going to a rendezvous, wasn’t she? Then she and the man she went to meet quarreled, and he killed her by throwing her over the cliff.”
“And the handcuffs?”
Sedgwick’s hands went to his head. “That, of course, is the inexplicable thing. But don’t you think that was the way she met her death?” ”

“ When I think a man knows something which I wish to know but do not know, I try to possess myself of his knowledge, whether he is microscopist, astrologer, or tinsmith. To that extent I am a scientist.”
“And you expect the stars to tell us something about my lost topazes?”
“They seem to have had some influence on the career of the original owner,” said Kent, with his half smile. “And one star has already lighted up the beginning of the trail for me.” ”

“ There was no answering contempt in Chester Kent’s voice as he replied, “But a ring, constantly worn and then removed, leaves an unmistakable mark. Perhaps she gave you greater credit for powers of observation than you deserve. I’m afraid, Frank, that she is a married woman; and I’m sure, from reading between your lines, that she is a good woman. What the connection between her and the corpse on the beach may be, is the problem. My immediate business is to discover who the dead woman is.”
“And mine,” said Sedgwick hoarsely, “to discover the living.” ”

“ In any case, Alexander Blair is striving to conceal some scandal, the nature of which I have no wish to guess. By the way, I should have added that he suspects a third person, an artist, resident not far from his place, of being his son’s assailant.”
“Francis Sedgwick.”
“You know the man?”
“It is on his behalf that I am acting,” replied Kent.
“My informant, however, inclines to the belief that Alexander Blair is wrong: that Wilfrid Blair killed the woman and then inflicted mortal wounds upon himself. Perhaps you would better see my informant for yourself.” ”

“ Kent whistled softly. The whistle had a purring quality of content.
“Not the same as the footprint, eh?” he remarked.
“Footprint too small,” grunted Gansett Jim.
“How many people; two?”
“Three.”
You see, you didn’t shoot Mr. Sedgwick, after all. “Three, of course. I had forgotten the circus-wagon man. He came later. But, Jim, you see it wasn’t Mr. Sedgwick.”
“What he follow for?” demanded the other savagely.
“No evil purpose. You can take his trail from the circus wagon and follow that, if you want to satisfy yourself further that he wasn’t here. I’ll let you have the lantern. ”