ISABEL OSTRANDER: Mystery & Western Classics: One Thirty, The Crevice, Anything Once, The Fifth Ace & Island of Intrigue. Isabel Ostrander
time did you leave?"
"Oh, early--between eleven and half-past, I think."
"And on your arrival home?"
"Father went to his study for a last cigar, and I went right up to bed, and read for an hour or two before I fell asleep. We weren't going on anywhere else. It's too early in the season for dances and that sort of thing, you know."
"I understand. Miss Carhart," he bent forward suddenly, as if to look into her face through his sightless eyes, and shot the question at her, "at what hour during the evening, and with whom, were you in the den?"
She shrank from him, her breath coming in great gasps.
"The-- den?" she faltered, through dry lips.
"The room in which Garret Appleton was afterward murdered," he persisted, inexorably.
"The--den!" she repeated. "Why, never--not once--not for an instant! I swear it!"
The detective drew back.
"Oh!" he muttered. "You said that you and young Mrs. Appleton and her husband sat chatting, while your father and the elder Mrs. Appleton played bridge. I thought perhaps you were in the den."
Miss Carhart drew a deep breath.
"Oh, no!" she said, hastily. "We were in the library."
He could feel her eyes upon him, deep and bright with suspicion.
"You say that young Mrs. Appleton was not well. Did she seem depressed, or unhappy?"
The sudden change of topic had the desired effect.
"How should I know?" the girl drew herself up coldly. "I did not notice her particularly. She seemed quite as usual."
"I thought perhaps you would have noticed. I understood you were great friends."
"I meant that my father and I were great friends of the Appleton family. I only know Garret's wife and her sister casually, not intimately."
"Well, Miss Carhart, I must leave you. No doubt Mrs. Appleton will return almost immediately with your father, and I must interview the servants. Thank you for [replying to my questions."
He turned gropingly, with outstretched hands, as if feeling for the door from which he had come to her with such unerring precision, and his hand came in contact with her head just where her hair billowed out from under her hat. He withdrew it at once, with a deprecatingly murmured apology, and, with an odd lack of his usual accuracy, fumbled for the door. On the sill, he paused, stopped, and picked up a filmy square of lace, so tiny that it had lain unnoticed in the general excitement by those who had passed over it. He turned, and walked straight back to where the girl sat watching him, with curious, fascinated eyes.
"Your handkerchief, I believe?" he asked, smilingly presenting it. "You must have dropped it when you entered."
Miss Carhart took it from his hand, glanced at it, and then swiftly back to his face, and her eyes were dark with apprehension.
"Thank you, it is mine," she said quietly.' "But -- how did you know?"
"The perfume," he explained, with courteous, but wearied, patience. "Wherever you are, wherever any personal article of yours lies, that individual, penetrating scent of yours would lead unmistakably to you. And then, too, if I am not mistaken, I felt the monogram D. C. in a comer of the handkerchief. Mrs. Appleton called you ' Doris.' It is quite simple, you see. Good-morning, Miss Carhart."
As he made his way slowly along the unfamiliar hall, he pondered. She had been in the den sometime the previous evening. The lingering, cloying perfume was unmistakable. Why had she denied it?
A man-servant passed through the hall, and, seeing him, approached deferentially.
"Mr. Gaunt, sir? Were you going to Mr Appleton's room? He expects you. I'm his man, sir. Shall I show you the way?"
"If you will, please. But where were you going just now?"
"To the kitchen, sir, with this tray."
"Tray?"
"Yes, sir. Mr. Yates Appleton's breakfast-tray."
The man's perceptible pause before the word "breakfast" was illuminating, but unnecessarily so to Gaunt.
"That is not a breakfast-tray, my man, unless your master partook of a most injudicious meal. He'd better not have anything more to drink today, if you can keep it away from him."
"Drink, sir? How--how did you know?" the valet stammered, the shaking tray almost slipping from his hands.
"From the tinkle of ice in the glass, and that purring sound of gas in the siphon. If that tray had been more heavily laden--with dishes, for instance--I should have heard them clink together, also, as you came toward me down the hall. What is your name?"
"James, sir."
"Well, James, at what hour did your master return home last night, or, rather, this morning?"
"At about three o'clock, sir."
"How do you know? Did you wait up for him?"
"Yes, sir. I mostly do, sir. It--it isn't often that he can get to bed by himself, sir." The man spoke apologetically, but with eager frankness. Evidently, he stood much in awe of his inquisitor.
"I understand. And in what condition was your master when he returned this morning?"
"About as usual. Quite--quite under the weather, so to speak, but not what you might call bad, sir.... This is his door."
James coughed discreetly, and knocked, and an irritable, highly strung voice bade him enter.
"Mr. Gaunt, sir," announced James, and departed swiftly and noiselessly.
"Oh I" said Yates Appleton, with a noticeable change of tone. "Come in, Mr. Gaunt. What is it you want to ask me? I'm afraid I've told you everything I know."
"I'd like to know what jewelry was taken from your brother's body," was the opening remark, which evidently surprised the younger man by its tenor.
"Oh, I've already given a list to Inspector Hanrahan, as nearly as I can remember, and Garret's man can tell me."
"Still, I should like to have you repeat it to me," the detective reiterated, patiently.
"Pearl studs, pearl and mother-of-pearl vest buttons and cuff-buttons, a small gold watch, thin gold cigarette-case, and a small seal purse. That's all, I think."
"All? No small jeweled pin, or insignia of some sort?"
. Yates Appleton's knuckles cracked suddenly, as he gripped the back of a high carved chair upon which he was leaning.
"Pin? I never thought of that! He did have some such thing, I believe. Frat' pin, from his university days, I imagine, although I never inquired. He was superstitious about it, and wouldn't go without it; but in dinner-clothes--"
"He wore it pinned inside his vest-pocket, in evening-clothes, didn't he?"
"Yes," Yates Appleton gasped, and looked his perturbed astonishment. "By Jove! I remember now, I've seen him pin it there once or twice, or under the lapel of his coat. Silly of him; but, as I say, he was superstitious about it. I'd like to know how you found it out, Mr. Gaunt. Hardly anybody knew about it."
"The thief did," Gaunt observed, quietly. "Rather unusual, wasn't it? The man who robbed and murdered him evidently was someone who knew him and his habits thoroughly--or else had nerve enough, after firing a shot, which, had it been heard, would have brought the whole house about his ears, to search his victim's clothes with the most minute detail."
"Hum-m! I never thought of that/' the young man answered, thoughtfully.
"What did you do last evening, Mr. Appleton? You went out immediately after dinner, did you not?"
"Almost immediately. Family parties always