The Incendiary: A Story of Mystery
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CHAPTER XXXII.
EMILY STRIKES A MATCH.
Beulah Ware called that evening to talk over their plans for a trip tothe provinces, which Dr. Eustis, the Barlows' family physician, hadimperatively ordered for the wasting girl. Could he have looked into herbrain while she was preparing to retire in her chamber, and seen thevelocity of the thoughts which were coursing through it then, he wouldsurely have lengthened the weeks to months.
"Would the will be upheld?" she asked herself. Dr. Silsby's oralevidence was strong in its favor and Shagarach had spoken hopefully oflate. The least that he could expect was a postponement until the trialwas concluded. Since the evening she spent at his house, the lawyer hadapplied himself, if possible, more sternly than ever to the case, andhis manner was more than ever that of a man repressing all lightness ofspirit to make room for weighty thoughts.
What a mesh they were all entangled in. Shagarach as well as Robert,with the monster reaching again and again at his life! AndMcCausland--she hated his eternal smile. As if this business of life ordeath were a comedy for his amusement or the display of his superfinepowers. She had begun to doubt whether their triumph over the false BillDobbs had been as genuine as they first supposed.
"A lie will travel a league while truth is putting on his boots," oldJohn Davidson had said, shaking his head, when she described theadventure to him. And the result had proved him right. Although thetruth leaked out, the original impression that Robert had really brokenout of prison was never quite corrected, and of course it did him nogood with the public.
In spite of herself, Emily could not help feeling that both thesepowerful minds were overreaching themselves by their very fertility andkeenness, like the colossus of old, which tumbled by its own hugeheight. For the hundredth time she set their theories before her, tryingto imagine how a jury would look at them.
Her rambling drowse naturally brought back the whole trip toHillsborough and her conversation with Bertha. She tried to recall everyword that the housemaid had uttered, rendered doubly precious, as itseemed to Emily, by the impossibility of consulting her again until thetrial. What she had said of the previous fire especially struck Emilynow. She tried to form a vivid picture on the curtain of darkness whichsurrounded her of that fatal study. The books all upright on theirshelves, the canary bird singing, the waste-basket, the slippers underthe arm-chair, and the dressing-gown thrown over it, the dog--suddenlyEmily's heart stood still. She started up in bed and sat on its edge.
A minute later she was feeling for the match-box. As she stood beforethe mirror, her image came out slowly, slowly, emerging by thesulphurous blue flame. Lighting the gas, she drew the curtains. The barkof a watchdog broke the silence, or the footsteps of tardy home-comers,and now and then the shrill, faint whistle of a distant steamer,ocean-bound. But her ears were closed to outer impressions. She snatchedat a volume of the great encyclopedia which she kept in her room, and,sitting on the bed, laid one knee across its fellow for a book-rest. Inthis posture she read eagerly, then exchanged the volume for another,and that for another, until she had ranged through the entire set andpeeped at every letter from Archimedes to Zero, with long and veryattentive stops at many curious headings. It was after 1 o'clock whenshe turned out the light and nearly 3 when her brain stopped buzzing.Next morning she limped in her left knee where the heavy encyclopediahad rested and her eyes were dull at their work.
The idea was so bold, so novel, that she waited a day before submittingit to Shagarach. Beulah Ware was her first confidant. Beulah took it upenthusiastically, and was for developing it farther before giving it outat all. But Emily judged this secrecy unjust to her lawyer, and,besides, was eager to know his opinion. He listened with interest to her"maybes" and "might bes" and commented in his usual tone of conviction.
"There are a great many 'ifs.' You depend entirely upon Bertha, and sheis not at hand. When she does appear it will be so late that you willhave little time to work up your idea. This is not said to discourageyou; only to point out the obstacles you must surmount. By all meansfollow out the thought."
This was not the worst that Emily had feared, although she understoodthat it meant "There are at present only two theories, McCausland's andmine. Those are the horns of the dilemma between which the jury mustchoose." Seeing that she did not reply, Shagarach turned the subjecttoward Walter Riley's case, which was more serious than his motherknew.
The robbery of the bicycles was only one of a series of thefts which hadbeen traced to this youthful "gang." In the club-room at Lonergan's, notonly the Whistler's bicycle, which he had refused to sell, but a storeof cigars, whisky, cheap jewelry and ladies' pocketbooks had been found,and the junkman, Bagley, was under arrest for acting as a "fence" to thethieves.
Walter asserted his innocence of other thefts, and also his ignorance ofall the articles excepting the bicycle, which they had urged him tosell. His refusal to do so was corroborated by Turkey and Toot. On thisvery head he had had a falling out with the crowd and had ceased tovisit the club-room, but, although it was frequented by as many astwenty youngsters, some of them half-grown men, no one had dared to heedBagley's suggestion and dispose of Walter's abandoned property.
"Riley's act at its worst was no more serious than breaking a window orplucking pears from the tree. With your help he may get clear and be puton probation."
"Oh, must I testify?" asked Emily.
"Next Monday the case will be heard. You can be of service to the boy. Ishall recommend short terms for Fenton and Watts."
Emily promised to be present. While she was returning to her studio oldJohn Davidson overtook her in his carriage. She was glad to meet hiskindly glance again and accept his proffered seat, especially as sheespied the manikin, Kennedy, crossing the street in her direction. Itwas only a few blocks to her destination, but before they arrived shehad poured out her new theory to the marshal, as if he were her father.
"Don't you think it's possible, Mr. Davidson?" she appealed to him,craving a morsel of sympathy.
"Possible? Of course it's possible," he answered cheerily; "I've metthings a hundred times stranger myself."
But Emily's heart sunk a little, for she saw that he only spoke so outof kindness and that he did not really believe in her idea. And fromthat day she followed Beulah Ware's advice and hardly mentioned it,except to Beulah.