The Deep Lake Mystery

“Yes, Mr. Ames, I am investigating the Tracy matter. I have accomplished so far only some preliminary work, and I hope for success, of course, or I shouldn’t keep on with the case.”

“One more question, then. Are you making your investigation at my request, at my expense, and under my direction?”

“No, I think not.” Keeley spoke with utmost good nature, but with a decided shake of his head. “You see, it irks me to work for another, if I am interested in a case for myself.”

“Why are you so interested in this case?”

Kee stared at him.

“Because it is a case to interest all residents of Deep Lake district. Because murder has been done in our hitherto peaceful community and every right-thinking man must or should be interested. If by my experience and training I am better able than some to look into the facts and indications of the evidence gathered, it is surely my duty to do so, regardless of requests or directions from anybody else.”

“Well, then, after all,” Ames smiled, “I can’t see that it matters much, except that if you’re working for me, you get paid for it, if you’re on your own, you don’t.”

I couldn’t quite understand this man. Suave, polished, and of gentle voice and correct manners, he now and then broke out with a brusque, blunt speech that seemed to betray a cruder nature beneath his veneer.

Yet he had said nothing really rude, had only stated the bald facts of the matter.

I glanced at March. He too, was covertly studying Ames. I felt sure he was puzzled in the same way I was.

Keeley, however, seemed ready to meet Ames on his own ground.

“Yes,” he added, “you’ve struck it right. Work for you and take your money, or go it alone and get no pay. Well, Mr. Ames, I’m going it alone this trip. But, if I don’t take your money, mayn’t I ask for something else from you? Won’t you give me some advice or some data or some facts you’ve picked up – ”

“Why should I?”

“Because, though I’m not working at your direction, I shall do just as good work, in fact, just the same work as if I were. Therefore, you will get the results the same as if you paid for them. Oughtn’t that to make you willing to help in any way you can?”

“But you’re assuming I want to save money. You speak as if I should be glad not to have to pay your bill. Not so, Mr. Moore. When I asked you to take me as a client, I was, and am, perfectly willing to shoulder the expenses.”

“I see; then, Mr. Ames, the question of price doesn’t interest you. Therefore, I ask of you, as you ask of me, to help me with any information you may possess.”

“And how do you know I possess any?”

“Because you are afraid. You are not afraid for yourself but for some one else.”

It was when Kee was making a statement of this sort that he was at his best. His good-looking face grew positively handsome in its impressive strength and forcefulness.

Only I, and perhaps Lora, knew that it was play acting. Knew that what Keeley Moore said in this histrionic manner was, almost always, merely bluff. He didn’t know at all that Ames was shielding some one else, but this was his way of finding out. And nine times out of ten it was successful.

It was this time.

Harper Ames collapsed like a man struck by lightning. He fell back in his seat and turned a sickly white.

I felt sorry for him. It didn’t seem quite cricket for Kee to get him like that. I moved toward him, but Moore spoke sharply: “Let him alone, Gray, don’t touch him.”

That moment, however, had given Ames time to pull himself together.

Also, his insolent manner returned to him.

“I get you, Moore,” he said, with an unpleasant laugh. “We are enemies, then? So be it. You have turned me down, now I turn you down, and the thing I came to tell you, you will never know. The investigation you propose to make will be futile; the success you so confidently hope for you will never achieve.”

The man was very angry. Indeed, his rage was a revelation to me. I had not supposed him capable of such fierce passions. It flashed across my mind that a man like that could murder on a sudden provocation.

But now March took a hand.

“Mr. Ames,” the police detective said, in a quiet way, “you have said too much not to say more. Since you admitted you came here to tell something, you are obliged to tell it.”

“And if I refuse?”

“You will be called upon to tell it to the chief of police.”

“And if I still refuse?”

“I think you know for yourself the consequences of such a procedure.”

Ames sat silent a few moments and then he said:

“Oh, I don’t want any unpleasantness. My speech was partly bluff, but what there is to it, I am quite willing to tell you. It is only that after I went to my room that night, after leaving Mr. Tracy, I heard sounds, of which I have not told.”

“Important sounds?”

“That’s as may be. How do I know? I heard, or I thought I heard, a step on the stair.”

“Are you sure, Mr. Ames?” asked March. “For I cannot manage to make a step that is audible on those softly carpeted stairs at Pleasure Dome.”

Ames looked at him in surprise.

“Is that so? Well, it may have been a step in the hall – ”

“Nor along the thick carpet of the hall – ” went on March, as if he had not been interrupted.

“You’re trying to say I lie,” Ames cried out. “But it is true. I will not say, then, what the sound was, but I did hear a slight sound outside my door a little before two o’clock – ”

“Did it waken you?” March spoke eagerly.

“N-no, I was awake – I think. But I heard it distinctly, though very faintly. It was like – ”

“Yes, what was it like? You said, like a step.”

“No, not like a step – like a gliding, shuffling movement and a – a – ”

“Go on.”

“Like a stick or something dragged across my door.”

“Dragged?”

“Oh, I mean, drawn across my door, – here, like this.”