The Breaking Point

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  XLIV

  To Dick the last day or two had been nightmares of loneliness. He threwcaution to the winds and walked hour after hour, only to find thatthe street crowds, people who had left a home or were going to one,depressed him and emphasized his isolation. He had deliberately putaway from him the anchor that had been Elizabeth and had followed atreacherous memory, and now he was adrift. He told himself that he didnot want much. Only peace, work and a place. But he had not one of them.

  He was homesick for David, for Lucy, and, with a tightening of theheart he admitted it, for Elizabeth. And he had no home. He thought ofReynolds, bent over the desk in his office; he saw the quiet tree-shadedstreets of the town, and Reynolds, passing from house to house in thelittle town, doing his work, usurping his place in the confidence andfriendship of the people; he saw the very children named for him asking:"Who was I named for, mother?" He saw David and Lucy gone, and theold house abandoned, or perhaps echoing to the laughter of Reynolds'children.

  He had moments when he wondered what would happen if he took Beverly ather word. Suppose she made her confession, re-opened the thing, to fillthe papers with great headlines, "Judson Clark Not Guilty. A StrangeStory."

  He saw himself going back to the curious glances of the town, never tobe to them the same as before. To face them and look them down, to hearwhispers behind his back, to feel himself watched and judged, on thatfar past of his. Suppose even that it could be kept out of the papers;Wilkins amiable and acquiescent, Beverly's confession hidden in the ruckof legal documents; and he stealing back, to go on as best he could,covering his absence with lies, and taking up his work again. But eventhat uneasy road was closed to him. He saw David and Lucy stooping tonew and strange hypocrisies, watching with anxious old eyes the faces oftheir neighbors, growing defiant and hard as time went on and suspicionstill followed him.

  And there was Elizabeth.

  He tried not to think of her, save as of some fine and tender thing hehad once brushed as he passed by. Even if she still cared for him, hecould, even less than David and Lucy, ask her to walk the uneasy roadwith him. She was young. She would forget him and marry Wallace Sayre.She would have luxury and gaiety, and the things that belong to youth.

  He was not particularly bitter about that. He knew now that he had givenher real love, something very different from that early madness of his,but he knew it too late...

  He looked up at Bassett and then sat up.

  "What sort of news?" he asked, his voice still thick with sleep.

  "Get up and put some cold water on your head. I want you to get this."

  He obeyed, but without enthusiasm. Some new clue, some hope revived onlyto die again, what did it matter? But he stopped by Bassett and put ahand on his shoulder.

  "Why do you do it?" he asked. "Why don't you let me go to the devil inmy own way?"

  "I started this, and by Heaven I've finished it," was Bassett's exultantreply.

  He sat down and produced a bundle of papers. "I'm going to read yousomething," he said. "And when I'm through you're going to put yourclothes on and we'll go to the Biltmore. The Biltmore. Do you get it?"

  Then he began to read.

  "I, the undersigned, being of sound mind, do hereby make the followingstatement. I make the statement of my own free will, and swear beforeAlmighty God that it is the truth. I am an illegitimate son of ElihuClark. My mother, Harriet Burgess, has since married and is now known asHattie Thorwald. She will confirm the statements herein contained.

  "I was adopted by a woman named Hines, of the city of Omaha, whose nameI took. Some years later this woman married and had a daughter, of whomI shall speak later.

  "I attended preparatory school in the East, and was sent duringvacations to a tutoring school, owned by Mr. Henry Livingstone. When Iwent to college Mr. Livingstone bought a ranch at Dry River, Wyoming,and I spent some time there now and then.

  "I learned that I was being supported and sent to college from fundsfurnished by a firm of New York lawyers, and that aroused my suspicion.I knew that Mrs. Hines was not my mother. I finally learned that I wasthe son of Elihu Clark and Harriet Burgess.

  "I felt that I should have some part of the estate, and I developed ahatred of Judson Clark, whom I knew. I made one attempt to get moneyfrom him by mail, threatening to expose his father's story, but I didnot succeed.

  "I visited my mother, Hattie Thorwald, and threatened to kill Clark. Ialso threatened Henry Livingstone, and his death came during a disputeover the matter, but I did not kill him. He fell down and hit his head.He had a weak heart.

  "My foster-sister had gone on the stage, and Clark was infatuated withher. I saw him a number of times, but he did not connect me with theletter I had sent. My foster-sister's stage name is Beverly Carlysle.

  "She married Howard Lucas and they visited the Clark ranch at Norada,Wyoming, in the fall of 1911. I saw my sister there several times,and as she knew the way I felt she was frightened. My mother, HattieThorwald, was a sort of maid to her, and together they tried to get meto go away."

  Bassett looked up.

  "Up to that point," he said, "I wrote it myself before I saw him." Therewas a note of triumph in his voice. "The rest is his."

  "On the night Lucas was killed I was to go away. Bev had agreed to giveme some money, for the piece had quit in June and I was hard up. Shewas going to borrow it from Jud Clark, and that set me crazy. I felt itought to be mine, or a part of it anyhow.

  "I was to meet my mother in the grounds, but I missed her, and I went tothe house. I wasn't responsible for what I did. I was crazy, I guess.I saw Donaldson on the side porch, and beyond him were Lucas and Clark,playing roulette. It made me wild. I couldn't have played roulette thatnight for pennies.

  "I went around the house and in the front door. What I meant to do wasto walk into that room and tell Clark who I was. He knew me, and all Imeant to do was to call Bev down, and mother, and make him sit up andtake notice. I hadn't a gun on me.

  "I swear I wasn't thinking of killing him then. I hated him like poison,but that was all. But I went into the living-room, and I heard Clarksay he'd lost a thousand dollars. Maybe you don't get that. A thousanddollars thrown around like that, and me living on what Bev could borrowfrom him.

  "That sent me wild. Lucas took a gun from him, just after that, and saidhe was going to put it in the other room. He did it, too. He put it on atable and started back. I got it and pointed it at Clark. I'd have shothim, too, but Bev came into the room.

  "I want to exonerate Bev. She has been better than most sisters to me,and she has lied to try to save me. She came up behind me and grabbed myarm. Lucas had heard her, and he turned. I must have closed my hand onthe trigger, for it went off and hit him.

  "I was in the living-room when Donaldson ran in. I hid there until theywere all gathered around Lucas and had quit running in, and then Igot away. I saw my mother in the grounds later. I told her where therevolver was and that they'd better put it in the billiard room. I wasafraid they'd suspect Bev.

  "I have read the above statement and it is correct. I was legallyadopted by Mrs. Alice Ford Hines, of Omaha, and use that signature. Igenerally use the name of Frederick Gregory, which I took when I was onthe stage for a short time.

  "(Signed) Clifton HINES."

  Bassett folded up the papers and put them in the envelope. "I gotthat," he said, "at the point of a gun, my friend. And our friend Hinesdeparted for the Mexican border on the evening train. I don't mindsaying that I saw him off. He held out for a get-away, and I guess it'sjust as well."

  He glanced at Dick, lying still and rigid on the bed.

  "And now," he said. "I think a little drink won't do us any harm."

  Dick refused to drink. He was endeavoring to comprehend the situation;to realize that Gregory, who had faced him with such sneering hate a dayor so before, was his half-brother.

  "Poor devil!" he said at last. "I wish to God I'd known. He was right,you know. No wonder--"

  Sometime later he roused
from deep study and looked at Bassett.

  "How did you get the connection?"

  "I saw Melis, and learned that Hines was in it somehow. He was theconnecting link between Beverly Carlysle and the Thorwald woman. But Icouldn't connect him with Beverly herself, except by a chance. I wireda man I knew in Omaha, and he turned up the second marriage, and adaughter known on the stage as Beverly Carlysle."

  Bassett was in high spirits. He moved about the room immensely pleasedwith himself, slightly boastful.

  "Some little stroke, Dick!" he said. "What price Mr. Judson Clarkto-night, eh? It will be worth a million dollars to see Wilkins' facewhen he reads that thing."

  "There's no mention of me as Livingstone in it, is there?"

  "It wasn't necessary to go into that. I didn't know--Look here," heexploded, "you're not going to be a damned fool, are you?"

  "I'm not going to revive Judson Clark, Bassett. I don't owe himanything. Let him die a decent death and stay dead."

  "Oh, piffle!" Bassett groaned. "Don't start that all over again. Don'tpull any Enoch Arden stuff on me, looking in at a lighted window andwandering off to drive a taxicab."

  Suddenly Dick laughed. Bassett watched him, puzzled and angry, with asort of savage tenderness.

  "You're crazy," he said morosely. "Darned if I understand you. Here I'vegot everything fixed as slick as a whistle, and it took work, believeme. And now you say you're going to chuck the whole thing."

  "Not at all," Dick replied, with a new ring in his voice. "You're right.I've been ten sorts of a fool, but I know now what I'm going to do. Takeyour paper, old friend, and for my sake go out and clear Jud Clark. Putup a headstone to him, if you like, a good one. I'll buy it."

  "And what will you be doing in the meantime?"

  Dick stretched and threw out his arms.

  "Me?" he said. "What should I be doing, old man? I'm going home."