The Curved Blades

“Meanwhile, I may be arrested?” Pauline’s voice was a mere whisper; her face was drawn and white with fear. To Stone she did not look like a guilty woman, but like an innocent girl, frightened at thought of unjust suspicion and terrorized by imagination of the unknown horrors that might come to her.

“Oh, help me!” she moaned, “Mr. Stone, can’t you help me?”

“Pauline!” he exclaimed, taking her hands in his; “Pauline! Go!” he cried, tensely: “I will save you, but until I do, keep away from me! You unnerve me! I cannot think!”

“I understand!” and Pauline slowly drew her hands from his. “I will keep away from you.”

Stone let her go. He closed the door after her, locked it, and threw himself into a chair. What had he done? Full well he knew what he had done. Hardy was right. He had fallen in love with Pauline Stuart! He realized it, quietly, honestly, as he would have realized any incontrovertible fact. His subconsciousness was that of a deep, still gladness; but, strangely enough, his surface thought was that since he had fallen in love with her, so undeniably, so irrevocably, she must be innocent.

Then on the heels of this thought, came another, equally logical: if he deemed her innocent, was it not only because he loved her?

It was only after an hour of deep thought that Fleming Stone pulled himself together and realized with a conquering assurance, that he could go on with the case, and do his duty. If, as he was confident, he could prove his vague theory to be fact, then his love for Pauline would help him to good work and triumphant conclusions. If, instead, his further investigations showed his theory to be false, then he must push on, and if – it couldn’t be, but if – well, – he could always drop the case. But, – and of this he was certain, – his heart should not only be kept from interfering with the work of his head but it should help and encourage such desperately clever work that success must come.

Pauline did not appear at dinner that night, and on inquiry, Stone was told she had gone over to New York for a day or two.

This, then, was what she had meant when she said, “I will keep away from you.”

The next day came District Attorney Matthews to interview Miss Stuart. Her absence from home annoyed him and he asked for her New York address. This no one knew, as she had not informed any of them where she was staying in the city, and Mr. Matthews went off in a state of angry excitement. But the household at Garden Steps was even more excited.

For this was the first sign of a definite action against Pauline. What it meant or how far it would go, no one could say.

And then, that afternoon, came a letter from Pauline herself. It had been mailed in New York that morning and contained the surprising news that Pauline had sailed at noon that day for Alexandria.

“Get her back!” roared Haviland, as he read the letter. “Wireless the steamer and make her get picked up by some incoming ship! Don’t think of expense! She musn’t run off like that! It’s equivalent to confession of the crime!”

“Hush!” demanded Fleming Stone. “How dare you say that?”

“It’s true!” cried Anita. “Why else would Pauline run away? She knew she was on the verge of arrest and she fled to Carr Loria. He will hide her from her pursuers.”

“He can,” said Haviland, thoughtfully: “maybe it’s as well she’s gone there. Of course, she did it.”

“Of course, she didn’t!” and Fleming Stone’s voice trembled in its very intensity. “And I shall prove to a lot of dunder-headed police that she didn’t, but it will make my work much harder if you two insist on Miss Stuart’s guilt. Why do you want to railroad her into conviction of a crime she never dreamed of?”

“Then who did it?” demanded Anita. “To whom was Miss Lucy speaking when she said those things I heard?”

“If you harp on that string much longer,” said Stone, looking at her, “one might almost be justified in thinking she said them to you.”

“No,” said Anita, in a low, awed voice, and looking straight at Fleming Stone, “no, she did not say them to me.”

And Stone knew she spoke the solemn truth.

But she had not spoken the truth when she said she saw Pauline Stuart coming from the boudoir of her aunt.

XIX

LETTERS FROM THE FUGITIVE

Pauline’s flight was deemed by many a confession of guilt. The District Attorney declared his intention of cabling a command to hold her for examination at Alexandria. Or, he said, perhaps it would be better to intercept her course at Gibraltar or Naples.

The people at Garden Steps paid little attention to these suggestions, so absorbed were they in planning for themselves.

“Poor child,” said Haviland, “she ran away in sheer panic. You don’t know Pauline as we do, Mr. Stone; she is brave in the face of a present or material danger. When a gardener’s cottage burned, she was a real heroine, and saved a tiny baby at risk of her own life. But always a vague fear or an intangible dread throws her into a wild, irresponsible state, and she loses her head utterly. Now, I may as well own up that I do think Polly committed this deed. I think that she had stood Aunt Lucy as long as she possibly could, and you’ve no idea what the poor child had to put up with. I think that when Lady Lucy threatened to send Pauline away, homeless and penniless, this panic of fear overcame her and she gave that poison, on an impulse, – ”

“But,” interrupted Stone, “that would imply her having the poison in readiness. She couldn’t procure it at a moment’s notice.”

“That’s so,” agreed Haviland, thoughtfully; “but, even so, it’s my belief that that’s the way it all happened. How Pauline got the stuff I’ve no idea, but there’s no other explanation that fits the facts. Aunt Lucy’s aversion to drugs or medicines could have been overcome by few people, but Pauline could have wheedled her into taking it by some misrepresentation of its healing qualities or something like that.”

“It must have been under some such misapprehension that she took it,” said Stone. “For I’m convinced she took it dissolved in a glass of water, and therefore, was conscious of the act, though not of the nature of the dose. But couldn’t Miss Stuart have given it innocently by mistake, as a headache powder, or – ”

“Miss Carrington never had headaches,” returned Anita, “and, any way, Pauline couldn’t make such a mistake. It isn’t as if Miss Carrington had a medicine cabinet like other people, where drugs might get mixed up. No, Mr. Stone, there was no mistake.”

“You think Miss Stuart administered the poison purposely, to kill her aunt?”

It would have been a brazen soul indeed, that could have spoken falsely under the piercing gleam in Fleming Stone’s eyes then.

“I am forced to think that,” replied Anita, quietly. “And you know I was present when Miss Carrington denounced Pauline and told her to leave this house the next day. And I also heard Miss Carrington when she said, later, that half her fortune should not go to a niece who treated her as Pauline did – ”

“Would she have used those words in speaking to Miss Stuart?” asked Stone, pointedly.

“Surely she would. Why not?”

“Never mind all that, ’Nita,” said Haviland. “Polly’s gone, – run away, – and it’s up to us to do all we can to help her. If her flight means she’s guilty, never mind, we must stand up for her, and deny anything that incriminates her. If she did poison Aunt Lucy, we don’t want her convicted of it. She’ll go straight to Loria, and he’ll look out for her all right. But if we find anybody’s going to head her off at Naples, or anywhere, we must warn her and help her to thwart their plans.”

“Accessory after the fact – ” began Stone.

“Sure!” said Haviland. “You bet we’ll be accessories after the fact, to help Polly out! Why, Mr. Stone, if she did this thing, the best possible plan for her was to vamoose, just as she did do. Carr Loria can hide her in Egypt, so nobody can find her, and after a while – ”

“Mr. Haviland,” and Stone’s eyes gleamed, “I am surprised at your attitude. How can you so easily take Miss Stuart’s guilt for granted?”

“No other way out. Now, look here, Mr. Stone, neither Miss Frayne nor I did this thing. We weren’t tied to Miss Carrington’s apron strings. We could walk off and leave her if we chose. But Miss Stuart couldn’t. Her life was a perfectly good hell on earth. I know all about it, a lot more, even, than Miss Frayne does. I don’t quite say I don’t blame Polly, but I do say I quite understand it. She is an impulsive creature. She’ll stand an awful lot and then fly all to pieces at some little thing that sets her nerves on edge. She’s clever as the Devil, and if she procured that aconite, long ago, say, it was in anticipation of some time when she – well, when she just reached the limit. And it happened to come that night. That’s all.”

“Wrong, Mr. Haviland, all wrong!” and Stone’s face was positively triumphant. “I’ve found an additional hint, in what you’ve just said, and I’m convinced I’m on the right track! One more question, Miss Frayne, about that conversation you so luckily overheard.”

“Luckily?” said Anita, her great blue eyes showing alarm in their startled gaze.

“Surely! Most fortunate, to my mind. Indeed, it may well be that that carefully exact memorandum of yours may be the means of clearing Miss Stuart of all suspicion. Now, tell me this. You heard only Miss Carrington’s voice, as if speaking to somebody. Did it sound as if she spoke always to the same person, or to more than one at the different times?”

“Well, it did sound as if she spoke to different persons, but it couldn’t have been so. Surely, if there had been more than one I must have heard some other words than her own.”

“Never mind your own surmises. You say, it seemed as if she addressed more than one person. Why?”

“Because she used a different intonation. At times angry, at times loving. But this is only an impression, as I now look back in memory. I haven’t thought about this point before.”

“Nor need you think of it again. You have told me all I want to know, and I assure you it will be of no use for you to mull this over or give it another thought.”

“But I don’t want you to think, Mr. Stone,” and Anita began to cry, “that I want to suspect Pauline – ”

“I am not considering your wishes in the matter,” said Stone, coldly. “If you do not want to think Miss Stuart implicated in this matter, your words and actions are unintelligible to me, but they are equally unimportant, and I have neither time nor thoughts to waste on them.”