armed with a pistol. If Siders was supposed to have beeninterrupted when writing a letter, interrupted by a thief come withintent to steal, a thief armed with a revolver, the sight of this weaponalone would be sufficient to insure his not moving from his seat. Ican understand the open drawers and cupboard; that is explained by thethief's hasty search for booty. But the torn window curtain and theoverturned chairs are peculiar.
"Of course there is always a possibility that the thief might haveentered one room while Siders was in the other; that the latter mighthave surprised the robber in his search for money or valuables, and thatthere might have been a hand-to-hand struggle before the intruder couldpull out his revolver. Oh, if I could only have seen the body! Thisis working under terrific difficulties. The marks of a hand-to-handstruggle would have been very plain on the clothes and on the person ofthe murdered man. But this letter? I do not understand this letter atall. It is the dead man's handwriting, that we know, but why did not thefriend to whom it was addressed come forward and make himself known? Asfar as I can learn from the police reports in G------, there was no personalinterest shown, no personal inquiries made about the dead man. There wasonly the natural excitement that a murder would create. Now a family,expecting to make a pleasure excursion with a friend in a day or twoand suddenly hearing that this friend had been found murdered in hislodgings, would be inclined to take some little personal interest inthe matter. These people must have been in town and at home, for theexcursion spoken of in the letter was to occur two days after themurder. Miss Roemer's remark about the dread that some people have as toany connection with the police, is true to a limited extent only. It istrue only of the ignorant mind, not of a man presumably well-to-do andproperly educated. I do not understand why the man to whom this letterwas addressed has not made himself known. The only explanationis--that there was no such man!" A sudden sharp whistle broke from thedetective's lips.
"I must examine the dead man's personal effects, his baggage, hispapers; there may be something there. His queer letter to Graumann--hisdesire that the latter's visit should be kept secret--a visit whichapparently had no cause at all, except to get Graumann to the house, toget him to the house in a way that he should be seen coming, but shouldnot be seen going away. What does this mean?
"Graumann was the only person against whom Siders had an active cause ofquarrel for the moment. There was one other man whom he hated, and thisother man was the prosecuting attorney who would conduct any case ofmurder that came up in the town of G------.
"Now John Siders is found murdered--is found killed, in his lodgings,the morning after he has arranged things so that his antagonist, hisrival in love, Albert Graumann, shall come under suspicion of havingmurdered him.
"What evidence have we that this man did not commit suicide? We have theevidence of the disorder in the room, a disorder that could have beenmade just as well by the man himself before he ended his own life. Wehave the evidence of a letter to some unknown, making plans forpleasure during the next days, and speaking of further plans, presumablyconcerning business, for the future. In a town the size of G------, whereevery one must have read of the murder, no one has come forward claimingto be the friend for whom this letter was written. Until this Unknownmakes himself known, the letter as an evidence points rather topremeditated suicide than to the contrary. Oh, if I could only have seenthe body! They tell me the pistol was found some little distance fromthe body. Is it at all likely that a murderer would go away leaving suchevidence behind him? If Graumaun had killed Siders in a hasty quarrel,he might possibly, in his excitement, have left his revolver. But I havealready disposed of this possibility. A man of sufficient brains toso carefully plan his suicide as to conceal every trace of it and castsuspicion upon the man who had made him unhappy, such a one would bequite clever enough to throw the pistol far away from his body and toleave no traces of powder on his coat or any such other evidence.
"If I were to say now what I think, I would say that John Sidersdeliberately took his own life and planned it in such a way as to castsuspicion upon Albert Graumann. But that would indeed be a terriblerevenge. And I must have some tangible proof of it before any court willaccept my belief. This proof must be hidden somewhere. The thing for meto do is to find it."
The evidence gathered at the time of the death went to show that Sidershad been paid a considerable sum in cash for the sale of his property atGrunau. And there was no trace of his having deposited this sum in anybank in G-------- or in Grunau, in both of which places he had depositedother securities. Therefore the money had presumably been in his roomat the time of his death. A search had been made for this money in everypossible place of concealment among the dead man's belongings, and ithad not been found. Muller asked the Police Commissioner to give him thekey to the rooms, which were still officially closed, and also the keysto the dead man's pieces of baggage. Commissioner Lange seemed to thinkall this extra search quite unnecessary, as it did not occur to him thatanything else was to be looked for except the money.
It was quite late when Muller began his examination of the dead man'seffects. He was struck by the fact that there was scarcely a bit ofpaper to be found anywhere, no letters, no business papers, except bankbooks showing the amount of his securities in the bank in G-------- and inGrunau, and giving facts about some investments in Chicago. There wasnothing of more recent date and no personal correspondence whatever. Thesame was true of the pockets of the suit Siders had been wearing at thetime of his death. A man of any property or position at all in the worldgathers about him so much of this kind of material that its absenceshows premeditation. The suit Siders had been wearing when he was killedwas lying on the table in the room. It was a plain grey business suitof good cut and material. The body had been prepared for burial ina beseeming suit of black. Muller made a careful examination of theclothes, and found only what the police reports showed him had alreadybeen found by the examination made by the local authorities. Upon asecond careful examination, however, he found that in one of the vestpockets there was a little extra pocket, like a change pocket, and init he found a crumpled piece of paper. He took it out, smoothed and readit. It was a post office receipt for a registered letter. The date wasstill clear, but the name of the person to whom the letter had beenaddressed was illegible. The creases of the paper and a certaindampness, as if it had been inadvertently touched by a wet finger, hadsmeared the writing. But the letter had been sent the day before thedeath of John Siders, and it had been registered from the main postoffice in G------. This was sufficient for Muller. Then he turned to thedesk. Here also there was nothing that could help him. But a suddenthought, came to him, and he took up the blotting pad. This, to hisdelight, was in the form of a book with a handsome embroidered cover. Itlooked comparatively new and was, as Muller surmised, a gift from MissRoemer to her betrothed. But few of the pages had been used, and on twoof them a closely written letter had been blotted several times, showingthat there had been several sheets of the letter. Muller held it up tothe looking-glass, but the repeated blotting had blurred the writingto such an extent that it was impossible to decipher any but a fewdisconnected words, which gave no clue. On a page further along onthe blotter, however, he saw what appeared to be the impression of anaddress. He held it up to the glass and gave a whistle of delight. Thewords could be plainly deciphered here:
"MR. LEO PERNBURG, "FRANKFURT AM MAIN, "MAINZER LANDSTRASSE."
and above the name was a smear which, after a little study, could bedeciphered as the written word "Registered."
With this page of the blotter carefully tucked away in his pocketbook,Muller hurried to the post office, arriving just at closing hour. Hemade himself known at once to the postmaster, and asked to be shownthe records of registered letters sent on a certain date. Here he foundscheduled a letter addressed to Mr. Leo Pernburg, Frankfurt am Main,sent by John Siders, G------, Josef Street 7.
Muller then hastened to the telegraph office and de
spatched a lengthytelegram to the postal authorities in Frankfurt am Main. When the answercame to him next morning, he packed his grip and took the first expresstrain leaving G------. He first made a short visit, however, to AlbertGraumann's cell in the prison. Muller was much too kind-hearted not torelieve the anxiety of this man, to whom such mental strain might easilyprove fatal. He told Graumann that he was going in search of evidencewhich might throw light on the death of Siders, and comforted theprisoner with the assurance that he, Muller, believed Graumann innocent,and believed also that within a day or two he would return to G-------- withproofs that his belief was the right one.
Three days later Muller returned to Grunau and went at once to theGraumann home. It was quite late when he arrived, but he had alreadynotified Miss Roemer by telegram as to his coming, with a request thatshe should be ready to see him. He
The Case of the Registered Letter Page 7