Harrington looked about him while he regained his breath. The moon was just rising, white and round, casting silver paths among the trees. After the violent interruption, die woods were resuming their murmurs and their squawkings.
“Do you know,” Whittaker added, “that the bullet you fired missed me by a fraction of an inch?”
“That’s as good as a mile. Wonder by how much I missed the other one.”
“What other one?”
“Wish I knew! I just had the briefest glimpse of somebody’s face at the window and saw a pistol aimed at the back of your skull, and then I fired.”
“H’m.” The district attorney peered at him thoughtfully in the moonlight. “Sure you saw that, or are you just imagining?”
“I saw it. And as I jumped out of the car, I saw somebody running into the woods. Couldn’t you hear the brush crackling?”
“Believe I did, come to think of it. I wasn’t listening, really. My head felt as if a million shots were roaring inside it Did you get a good look at the fellow?”
“No,” ruefully. “I haven’t the faintest idea what he looked like. It was only a second’s glimpse.”
“Well—“ Whittaker grinned dourly. “I bet I could describe him. Guess I won’t, though. May be wrong. Anyhow, this proves I’m on the right track. Somebody doesn’t like the way Storm and I carried on today, and so he thought he would stop us.”
“Then you think the man I saw at the car window was the man who murdered Marsh?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised.”
“But he didn’t go about it the way he went about the murder of Marsh.”
“Oh, no. A man isn’t likely to pull that trick more than once in a lifetime.”
Incongruities swam in Harrington’s mind. He recalled the strange things the district attorney had said just before the face appeared at the car window. It had been his impression that the solution to one of the knottiest problems connected with the Marsh murder had come to Whittaker in a flash.
“Whittaker,” he said, “you know how Marsh was killed?”
“No, I don’t. It’s just a guess, and it needs verification. Storm will have to help me out on that. Storm is—By Jove! If the murderer tried to kill me, he would certainly try to kill Storm, too. Wonder if anything has happened to him.”
The moonlight showed a look of alarm on his dour face. Harrington smiled.
“Oh, you needn’t worry. It isn’t likely the murderer is sharing your exalted opinion of Storm. The logical man to kill, if he wanted to put a stop to the real brain work in this investigation, was yourself.”
The district attorney looked very doubtful.
“I don’t like it,” he confessed. “The murderer didn’t follow us out here. He must have been here ahead of us. And what would he be doing out here except lay for Storm?”
“He might have come out to see how Storm was getting on. Maybe he got wind of the assignment you gave him. Most likely Storm has gone back to Peekacre.”
“Well, I hope so. And we’d better be getting back ourselves. I want to get there before Carmody leaves.” He chuckled moodily. “Much obliged to you for saving my life. And now you might as well give me that gun back. You are not guarding diamonds now.”
Harrington handed him the weapon and smiled wryly in contemplation of how Samuel Tarkin had turned the tables on him. They started walking back. Their unsuccessful chase had taken them about two hundred yards from the point where they had left the car.
Of a sudden Harrington stopped. The rising full moon was casting a silvery luminance over the woods, revealing objects that had not been visible before. Now Harrington’s eyes were fixed on a small tumbledown shack, perhaps a hunter’s cabin, some fifty feet further back into the woods. On an impulse Harrington started toward it.
“What now?” the district attorney grumbled.
“Come along,” Harrington flung back over his shoulder.
He moved cautiously through the underbrush, trying to make as little noise as possible. He had no definite idea that the murderous prowler had taken refuge in the cabin, but there was a chance that he had done so. Considering how quickly he had taken up the pursuit, the man could not have got far away.
Now he stopped behind a tree. There was a little clearing in front of him, and the cabin stood in the center of it. He waited until Whittaker came up.
“We’d better crawl,” he whispered. “We would make fine targets in the moonlight.”
Whittaker nodded, and they proceeded on hands and knees. Suddenly Harrington paused and signaled his companion to do likewise. A creaking sound, like that produced by a foot placed on a rotting board, had suddenly issued from the shack. Harrington’s heart gave a little lurch. His instinct had led him-aright. There was someone inside the cabin.
“Careful!” Whittaker admonished.
After a brief wait Harrington crawled forward again, keeping in the shadow of a tall poplar standing just outside the shack. Whittaker was just behind him, with his pistol ready for action. On close view the cabin appeared very small and in an extremely dilapidated condition. The door was open, and beyond it was the black, yawning interior.
Harrington’s veins tingled. Anything might lurk in that black space. A few more crawling motions, and he was at the door, one elbow resting on one of the crumbling wooden steps. Whittaker was at his side now, his pistol striking a hard metallic sheen through the moonlight, his hampered breathing testifying to his excitement.
After a brief wait, Harrington lifted his head. Perhaps it was a mad thing to do, for in this position he offered a splendid target for any one lying in wait within. He scanned the dark space, but the darkness was impenetrable.
Of a sudden he sprang to his feet. A peculiar sound had come from the interior. He had been straining his ears for sounds, but not a sound of this kind. He had expected to hear a trigger being cocked or to see the flash of a blade of steel, but this was different. It was the beginning of a scream that was instantly stifled into a groan.
He waited, spellbound, with cold shivers chasing up and down his spine. For a few moments all was still within, and then came a rattling sound that made his imagination picture a body writhing in agony. It was followed by a heavy thud that grated horribly on his taut nerves.
He rushed inside, and in the darkness he stumbled against something that sent a sickening shiver through his body. And then the darkness was brushed aside by a flashlight in Whittaker’s hand. Evidently his hand was shaking, for the white beam trembled. Harrington stared down at the floor. A man was lying there, with arms and legs twisted, and there was a red trickle from his chest There was a writhing movement of the arms and body, but it ceased in a few moments.
A dull, horrified exclamation broke from Whittaker’s lips. Harrington looked down at the dead man’s face. It was dark, and once it had been finely molded, but now the features were hideously distorted.
“Harry Stoddard!” he cried thickly.
Horror and astonishment clashed in his mind. He had expected to find anything but this. A shot fired out of the darkness would not have surprised him, but to come upon a dead body in the tumbledown old shack was a thing that went beyond the imagination. Strangest of all, the wound must have been inflicted while the two were waiting outside the cabin. It was then they had heard that curious, broken scream.
He looked about the little cabin. There was no sign of Stoddard’s assailant. Yet, since but a minute had passed since the scream rang out, he could not be far away. If he had taken refuge in the woods outside, the dry underbrush would have betrayed his movements.
On the floor, almost within reach of the dead man’s hand, lay a pistol Whittaker picked it up and examined it with a curious expression. He chuckled grimly as he tested the hammer and opened the cartridge chamber. Meanwhile Harrington glanced again about the little cabin, consisting of but a single room. It seemed as if the murderer must be skulking somewhere in the shadows along the walls.
“Hadn’t we better look aro
und?” he suggested in a whisper.
“What would we look for? Oh, the killer. No, I don’t think it would do any good. He’s too far away.”
“But he must have been here a minute or two ago.”
“Think so?” absently. “Well, you might have a look. I’ll stay here.”
Harrington cast him a long, puzzled glance, then proceeded cautiously along the cabin walls. Finding nothing, he went outside and walked around the hut, then searched the surrounding ground. Dry twigs and dead weeds crackled under his foot at every step, telling him again that the murderer could not have escaped without being heard. He went back inside. Whittaker was still absorbed in contemplation of the pistol.
“Ever see this before?” he asked.
Harrington took the weapon and inspected it.
“It might be the one Marsh had,” he declared.
“The one you picked up from the floor of the car and afterward lost in the hilltop hotel?”
“It looks like it. But I suppose there are thousands of the same kind.” He handed the pistol back. “Do you think Stoddard committed suicide?” he asked suddenly.
“Why should I think that?”
“The pistol was lying so close to his hand that it looked as if he had dropped it when he fell.”
Whittaker put the weapon in his pocket and appeared to consider the idea.
“No,” thoughtfully, “I don’t think Stoddard committed suicide. I must see what Storm thinks about it.”
“But isn’t it curious that Stoddard was killed just as we were crawling up to the cabin?”
“Yes,” said Whittaker with a dour grin, “and it’s curious that Marsh was killed just as he was about to pot you.”
Harrington gave him a long, puzzled glance, and again he wondered what was going on in the district attorney’s mind.
“You flattered me,” said Whittaker. “Modest though I am, you almost convinced me that the murderer wanted to kill me because he was afraid of me. I don’t think so now.”
Harrington recalled his brief glimpse of a face outside the car window.
“He was certainly aiming a pistol at you.”
“No doubt somebody was aiming a pistol at me. But as for the rest—Well, we’ll see. There’s nothing we can do here. I’ll telephone Doc Griffin from Peek-acre and have him come and take care of the body. Guess we’d better hurry back. Have a hunch we’re in for a bit of excitement tonight.”
Harrington was a greatly puzzled man as they walked back to the car.
CHAPTER XXIII — The Dark House
At the district attorney’s suggestion they stopped on a hill overlooking the valley in which, separated only by a narrow stretch of woods, the Marsh and Carmody residences were located.
“I want to think,” said Whittaker. “It’s a nuisance not to have Storm here to do my thinking for me. Now let’s see. There,” indicating a cluster of lights, “is the Marsh house. Looks as if something was going on. And there,” pointing to a single light twinkling through the trees, “is the Carmody place. Looks pretty quiet, doesn’t it? You can never tell, though. The quietest-looking place is sometimes the liveliest.”
“You are speaking of deeds of darkness?” Harrington surmised in a whimsical vein.
“Something like that. Now let me think. There’s no car on the Marsh place. As far as we know, Carmody and Miss Lanyard, as she calls herself, are still there. Of course, Carmody may have bucked up and walked home. He’s been an anxious man all day—ever since Carstairs dropped in and handed us the coffin.”
Harrington cast him a quick glance.
“It’s possible he doesn’t know,” Whittaker went on, “that Samuel Tarkin got the coffin away from you. Anyway, he is a worried man. And I guess Miss Lanyard is a worried girl I’d be worried, too, if there was a million dollars’ worth of diamonds at stake. And so they’ve been anxious all day to get back to the Carmody place. Maybe Tarkin is there waiting for them. Again, maybe he isn’t.”
His eyes ranged the valley between the two houses, one almost dark, the other brightly lighted.
“Wish I knew what to do,” he said plaintively. “Guess I’m too dependent on Storm. I had a clear idea when I started out, but a lot of things have happened since then.”
“What was your idea? You gave me an awful jolt when I saw you in the glass all of a sudden.”
“It was just an experiment. I wanted to see if it could be done.”
“But the conditions weren’t the same as when Marsh played the same trick.”
“No, not quite. Anyway, I thought a ride would do me good. Besides, I was getting worried about Storm. I’m still worried about him. Tell you what you do. Drive up as far as Luke Garbo’s garage, and then I’ll get out and walk up to the Marsh house and see what’s stirring. I want to telephone Doc Griffin, anyway.”
In an acutely puzzled state of mind Harrington did as directed. There was a light in the garage, but Luke Garbo was nowhere in sight. The district attorney got out and walked away with a rapid, lunging stride.
Harrington lighted a cigarette and waited. Being too nervous to remain still, he walked over to the garage and looked in. There was no sign of the proprietor anywhere. Harrington strolled back and forth a few times, and presently Whittaker’s rangy figure appeared around a bend in the road. He climbed inside the car and asked Harrington to drive toward the Carmody place.
“Storm got back,” he reported as the car was being swung around. “He was waiting for me at the Marsh house. It took him a long time to find what he was looking for.”
“Oh, he found it?”
“Of course he found it. Storm always gets what he goes after. Clever fellow, Storm.”
Harrington fixed him with a quizzical eye as he drove along, but Whittaker did not seem inclined to go into confidences.
“Carmody and Miss Lanyard are still there,” he went on. “It seems Carmody has been fretting terribly. Wouldn’t be surprised if he asked somebody to take him home in the car Storm used to go to Crooked Creek bridge.”
Harrington bent a scowling gaze on the moon-bathed road ahead. It seemed the district attorney was altogether too secretive. Yet, he realized, Whittaker had no desire to be tantalizing. Possibly he was not quite sure of his facts as yet.
“What’s Carmody fretting about?” he asked.
“The coffin, of course. He had the shock of his life when Carstairs walked in and calmly pulled the coffin from his pocket. Carmody doesn’t see how there can be two coffins exactly alike in both shape and size.”
“Two coffins? Then—“ Harrington stopped short, seized with a staggering thought.
“Yes,” said Whittaker, “that same coffin which Carstairs brought to Peekacre this morning should have been reposing in a snug hiding place in Carmody’s home. Carmody couldn’t believe his senses when Carstairs pulled it out of his pocket. The shock was too much for him. He collapsed under it. And all day he has been anxious to go home and see if there can possibly be a mistake somewhere.”
Harrington sat silent, guiding the wheel in an absent manner, his mind too full for words.
“But how did the coffin, with the diamonds in it, get into Carmody’s possession?” he finally blurted out.
“That’s what I’d like to know. Better stop here. Just as well not to advertise our arrival. It might be a good idea to park the car behind that dump of trees.” Mechanically Harrington drove the car off the road and maneuvered it into the desired position. He turned off the lights and they stepped out. Avoiding the driveway, they walked in silence through a sprinkling of pines and hemlocks, all the time guided by the single light shining in the house.
“We’ll work around to the back,” said Whittaker in an undertone, and they made a wide detour. Evidently the district attorney had been over the ground before, for he seemed thoroughly familiar with it. As they walked side by side, Harrington detected signs of a tension and a suppressed excitement about him.
A wall of stucco and stone loomed before them. There was no
t a single light on this side of the house. The moonlight tinged the black windows with a blurred iridescence. They stopped before a door, narrow and disproportionately tall, with a fanlight above it “I feel like an arsenal,” Whittaker muttered. “Two guns—my own and the one we found beside Stoddard’s body. Hope this door isn’t locked.”
Luckily it was not. The district attorney entered first, and Harrington followed. In the dark, without speaking a word, they made their way through several rooms. At length, after Whittaker had opened a door a crack, they stopped and listened. No sounds came. The district attorney moved forward and played his flashlight over the floor. They were in the library.
“Nice and cozy,” Whittaker observed, but his voice was not quite steady. He swung his torch over the walls, then focused it on a circular safe embedded in the oak paneling. “I could never see what people want with these flimsy wall safes. You could almost pry them open with a can opener. I certainly wouldn’t want to keep a million dollars’ worth of diamonds in one of them.”
Harrington bent a questioning gaze on his long, somber face. Whittaker moved away from the wall, put his torch on the desk and, displaying his white vest to advantage, looked about him.
“Devilish things, diamonds,” he soliloquized. “They seem to turn people’s minds. There have already been three murders on account of the ones in the coffin—Mooreland, Marsh and Stoddard. Maybe there’ll be another before the night is over. I wouldn’t be surprised—”
The buzzing of the telephone interrupted him. He looked at it dubiously, then walked up to the instrument and put the receiver to his ear.
“Hello,” he said in fair imitation of Martin Carmody’s timid voice. “Yes, this is Mr. Carmody. Oh, yes, Tarkin. Well?”
There was a brief conversation. The district attorney looked slyly pleased when he hung up the receiver.
“Tarkin wants Carmody or Miss Lanyard to meet him at the hilltop hotel,” he announced.
Harrington started, then stared at him for a moment.
“And Tarkin has the diamonds with him, of course.”
The Back-seat Murder Page 17