The Greatest Works of Arthur B. Reeve - 60 Titles in One Edition. Arthur B. Reeve
"Has anything happened?" asked Craig.
"A message came by a boy for Mrs. Pitta," whispered the valet.
"What did she do with it?"
"Tore it up."
"And the pieces?"
"She must have hidden them somewhere."
"See if you can get them."
Edward nodded and left us.
"Yes," I remarked after he had gone, "it does seem as if the thing to do was to get on the trail of a person bearing wounds of some kind. I notice, for one thing, Craig, that Edward shows no such marks, nor does any one else in the house as far as I can see. If it were an 'inside job' I fancy Edward at least could clear himself. The point is to find the person with a bandaged hand or plastered face."
Kennedy assented, but his mind was on another subject. "Before we go we must see Mrs. Pitts alone, if we can," he said simply.
In answer to his inquiry through one of the servants she sent down word that she would see us immediately in her sitting-room. The events of the morning had quite naturally upset her, and she was, if anything, even paler than when we saw her before.
"Mrs. Pitts," began Kennedy, "I suppose you are aware of the physical condition of your husband?"
It seemed a little abrupt to me at first, but he intended it to be. "Why," she asked with real alarm, "is he so very badly?"
"Pretty badly," remarked Kennedy mercilessly, observing the effect of his words. "So badly, I fear, that it would not require much more excitement like to-day's to bring on an attack of apoplexy. I should advise you to take especial care of him, Mrs. Pitts."
Following his eyes, I tried to determine whether the agitation of the woman before us was genuine or not. It certainly looked so. But then, I knew that she had been an actress before her marriage. Was she acting a part now?
"What do you mean?" she asked tremulously.
"Mrs. Pitts," replied Kennedy quickly, observing still the play of emotion on her delicate features, "some one, I believe, either regularly in or employed in this house or who had a ready means of access to it must have entered that kitchen last night. For what purpose, I can leave you to judge. But Sam surprised the intruder there and was killed for his faithfulness."
Her startled look told plainly that though she might have suspected something of the sort she did not think that any one else suspected, much less actually perhaps knew it.
"I can't imagine who it could be, unless it might be one of the servants," she murmured hastily; adding, "and there is none of them that I have any right to suspect."
She had in a measure regained her composure, and Kennedy felt that it was no use to pursue the conversation further, perhaps expose his hand before he was ready to play it.
"That woman is concealing something," remarked Kennedy to me as we left the house a few minutes later.
"She at least bears no marks of violence herself of any kind," I commented.
"No," agreed Craig, "no, you are right so far." He added: "I shall be very busy in the laboratory this afternoon, and probably longer. However, drop in at dinner time, and in the meantime, don't say a word to any one, but just use your position on the Star to keep in touch with anything the police authorities may be doing."
It was not a difficult commission, since they did nothing but issue a statement, the net import of which was to let the public know that they were very active, although they had nothing to report.
Kennedy was still busy when I rejoined him, a little late purposely, since I knew that he would be over his head in work.
"What's this—a zoo?" I asked, looking about me as I entered the sanctum that evening.
There were dogs and guinea pigs, rats and mice, a menagerie that would have delighted a small boy. It did not look like the same old laboratory for the investigation of criminal science, though I saw on a second glance that it was the same, that there was the usual hurly-burly of microscopes, test-tubes, and all the paraphernalia that were so mystifying at first but in the end under his skilful hand made the most complicated cases seem stupidly simple.
Craig smiled at my surprise. "I'm making a little study of intestinal poisons," he commented, "poisons produced by microbes which we keep under more or less control in healthy life. In death they are the little fellows that extend all over the body and putrefy it. We nourish within ourselves microbes which secrete very virulent poisons, and when those poisons are too much for us—well, we grow old. At least that is the theory of Metchnikoff, who says that old age is an infectious chronic, disease. Somehow," he added thoughtfully, "that beautiful white kitchen in the Pitts home had really become a factory for intestinal poisons."
There was an air of suppressed excitement in his manner which told me that Kennedy was on the trail of something unusual.
"Mouth murder," he cried at length, "that was what was being done in that wonderful kitchen. Do you know, the scientific slaying of human beings has far exceeded organised efforts at detection? Of course you expect me to say that; you think I look at such things through coloured glasses. But it is a fact, nevertheless.
"It is a very simple matter for the police to apprehend the common murderer whose weapon is a knife or a gun, but it is a different thing when they investigate the death of a person who has been the victim of the modern murderer who slays, let us say. with some kind of deadly bacilli. Authorities say, and I agree with them, that hundreds of murders are committed in this country every year and are not detected because the detectives are not scientists, while the slayers have used the knowledge of the scientists both to commit and to cover up the crimes. I tell you, Walter, a murder science bureau not only would clear up nearly every poison mystery, but also it would inspire such a wholesome fear among would-be murderers that they would abandon many attempts to take life."
He was as excited over the case as I had ever seen him. Indeed it was one that evidently taxed his utmost powers.
"What have you found?" I asked, startled.
"You remember my use of the sphygmomanometer?" he asked. "In the first place that put me on what seems to be a clear trail. The most dreaded of all the ills of the cardiac and vascular systems nowadays seems to be arterio-sclerosis, or hardening of the arteries. It is possible for a man of forty-odd, like Mr. Pitts, to have arteries in a condition which would not be encountered normally in persons under seventy years of age.
"The hard or hardening artery means increased blood pressure, with a consequent increased strain on the heart. This may lead, has led in this case, to a long train of distressing symptoms, and, of course, to ultimate death. Heart disease, according to statistics, is carrying off a greater percentage of persons than formerly. This fact cannot be denied, and it is attributed largely to worry, the abnormal rush of the life of to-day, and sometimes to faulty methods of eating and bad nutrition. On the surface, these natural causes might seem to be at work with Mr. Pitts. But, Walter, I do not believe it, I do not believe it. There is more than that, here. Come, I can do nothing more to-night, until I learn more from these animals and the cultures which I have in these tubes. Let us take a turn or two, then dine, and perhaps we may get some word at our apartment from Edward."
It was late that night when a gentle tap at the door proved that Kennedy's hope had not been unfounded. I opened it and let in Edward, the valet, who produced the fragments of a note, torn and crumpled.
"There is nothing new, sir," he explained, "except that Mrs. Pitts seems more nervous than ever, and Mr. Pitts, I think, is feeling a little brighter."
Kennedy said nothing, but was hard at work with puckered brows at piecing together the note which Edward had obtained after hunting through the house. It had been thrown into a fireplace in Mrs. Pitts's own room, and only by chance had part of it been unconsumed. The body of the note was gone altogether, but the first part and the last part remained.
Apparently it had been written the very morning on which the murder was