Murder at Bayside

by Raymond Robins

  Lyttle had the same idea about the race. “As a matter of fact, Mr. Williams, I have checked up on the whereabouts of the servants. The outside men were in town for the afternoon, James and the gate-keeper were together waiting for the police, and the other inside servants are women. As for any negro shooting Mr. Evans—well, you know the war-time anecdote of the negro regiment quartered at Brest? The tale goes that when the war was over the town wished to present the troops with pistols in token of the appreciation of their allies, but the colored spokesman said, “No, suh, Boss, jes’ remember we doan’ want no guns, but if you-alls want to give us some sort of weapon, we suah could use a razor.”

  I glanced at Lyttle out of the corner of my eye. He grinned cheerfully. “Oh, well, I’ll admit the story is somewhat apocryphal, but it expresses my feelings.”

  I was not to be side-tracked thus easily. “You mean, then, that the choice of weapon makes it a white man’s crime?”

  “Yes, among other things. It was quite a shot, you know, when you consider the fog and darkness.”

  “How about suicide?” I asked not very brightly, but with intent to draw him out.

  “A bit difficult since the bullet entered the back and no weapon was found. Incidentally, no discharged cartridge was found, either.”

  The conversation had taken away my appetite and I rose from my hastily consumed breakfast. It was impossible not to see where these clues were leading. Sergeant Lyttle got up when I did and, after a moment’s hesitation, asked me if I should care to assist in the examination of the gun-room.

  “Examination of the gun-room?” I repeated incredulously. “What on earth for?”

  “We are endeavoring to discover whether there is a possibility that the gun used came from there. You remember yesterday that Mr. Thomas himself suggested our making the search.”

  I did remember, and this was bringing the whole thing too close to the house for my liking. By using the same deferential tone in speaking of Tom, Lyttle almost convinced me that the police reasoning had not followed mine in direction; but then his next words, uttered as if in warning, lessened my assurance.

  “We have, of course, taken Mr. Thomas’ own gun, since we know it was fired yesterday.”

  I said nothing but led the way down the hall. The gun-room had always been a place of fascination to me, and especially the long, glass-enclosed case of pistols and revolvers which had been the principal pride of my old friend. I suppose I ought not to admit that a studious young corporation lawyer could be captured by the glamour of a dusty case containing oiled and polished steel and wood, but the truth is, I like to dream that perhaps some few particles of dust had been blown down by the winds of time from the old trails of the West, the far places, or even the battlefields of France which were not unknown to me. These were old guns, made by the loving hands of men long dead, guns that had played their part in high adventure, man’s guns, heavy, large-calibered, and made by man to hunt his most dangerous enemy. They were placed in a long row and their muzzles seemed to stare like a round-eyed jury, silently waiting to render an irrevocable verdict of life or death.

  The foreman of this jury, ancient yet able, was one of the grim advocates of Samuel Colt, who made all men equal on the old frontier. It was a solid-frame, single-action revolver with a small trigger-guard and the sweeping line of grip which had made it the chosen tool of John Wesley Hardin when he etched his name on the history of Arizona in soft and stinging smoke. There were six grim nicks in the left grip, placed there by hands now dust, and there was about a half an inch of uncut wood—the unfinished story of Tombstone and Billy the Kid.

  Lyttle scarcely paused at the pistol case, as a single glance was enough to inform him that the fatal bullet did not come from such guns as these. He was interested neither in daydreams nor in ancient pistols, and listening to his remarks I quite forgot how the heavy Colt had been fitted with a new hammer and cylinder, cunningly made by skilled craftsmen to be an exact duplicate in appearance to the old, and yet fashioned to shoot just such a cartridge as had sped the bullet into the back of Cyrus Evans. Charles had always asserted that the only thing such a gun lacked was modern ammunition, and with it he could out-shoot any of the new military automatics; he had made the change to prove his point.

  But Charles’ convictions never entered my mind, nor did I see where a little reasoning might have led us. I forgot about the gun’s having been remodeled, and I have wondered many times since what the outcome would have been, had I remembered. I do not believe it would have made any difference, we might have understood at that stage—but I do not know. Yet a life might have been saved, could we have correctly detached a single fact from its surrounding haze of emotions.

  “What other forty-fives are there in the house?” Lyttle wanted to know, and I brought back my wandering thoughts.

  “None save those the boys own.”

  “Are you sure? Both brothers showed me their guns.”

  “Quite.” I was surprised at what he told me.

  “May we go to your room?” he asked suddenly. “I want you to hear something James has to say, and I’d rather conduct the interview where there is no possibility of interruption.”

  Somewhat surprised, I consented and we went up the stairs. Lyttle paused to speak in a very low tone to one of his men.

  As soon as the door of my room was shut, the Sergeant turned to me and all at once dropped the mask behind which he had been hiding.

  “Look at here, Mr. Williams, you are the Evans’ family lawyer, aren’t you?”

  “Not exactly,” I answered cautiously. “I am junior partner in the law firm which has handled Mr. Cyrus Evans’ affairs for many years.”

  “You know the whole family though?”

  “Yes, of course. But since my senior, Mr. Vaile, does most of the business of the Evans’ estate, I may say my contact with the family has been more social than professional. However, I was joint executor in the matter of Mr. Edwin’s and Mr. Charles’ inheritance.”

  Lyttle considered this a moment. “Well, I suppose if there were any trouble, they’d retain you as a lawyer.”

  I was on guard now. “Naturally, I presume so, provided the trouble had to do with the estate.”

  The Sergeant immediately withdrew into his shell.

  Lyttle’s mental processes not infrequently resembled the contortions of a snail—one moment he was tossing his head in the breeze making rapid advances, the next he was snugly withdrawn in his fortified castle.

  James came in at this moment escorted by two troopers. He was very ill at ease and uncertain as to how to conduct himself.

  The Sergeant turned to him. “Now, James, I want you to tell me just what you did earlier this morning.”

  “Ah already done tole you every single thing Ah know.”

  “Well, I want to hear it again.”

  “All right, suh.” The negro knew better than to try to account for the peculiarities of the whites. “ ‘Spose you all just start me off what you want me to tell.”

  I suppressed a smile at this. I rather doubted if the police would get much out of James—but in this I was mistaken.

  James’ story coincided at first with what I already knew. He had gone to get Tom’s gun, as he was ordered, and then had gone down to the lodge gates to await the troopers. The story of the man on duty down there, as Lyttle afterwards told me, coincided with James’; of course, neither of them had heard any shooting.

  “Now, you say you gave Mr. Tom his gun. Would you know that gun again if you saw it?”

  “Yes, indeedy. Mr. Tom doan let nobuddy make no mistake about his gun. He got it out to Camp Perry fo’ bein’ the bes’ shot in the world—it say so, right on it.”

  “It doesn’t say quite that, but it’s the same idea. Now did you examine the gun before you came downstairs?”

  “No, suh; Ah wouldn’t ‘zamine it none. Ah jes’ opened out the clip to see was it loaded.”

  “And was it?”

  “Yess
uh. The magazine was full up. Ah looked ‘specially fo’ Ah once sent Mr. Cyrus out without enough shells, and he like to never got over the goose he shoulda had but didn’t have no shells fo’ it.”

  My heart sank at the implication of James’ words, and the fact that Lyttle had seen so clearly the obvious deduction to be drawn from them. To be sure, Tom had admitted firing the gun, but the admission was made before the situation became so grave. Now the story was made irrevocable with a witness to substantiate it. One gun and one only in Tom’s possession. He had gone out with a full clip and had come back with one shell fired.

  “That is all, James.” As the butler went out, Lyttle turned to me. “Do you consider the butler a reliable witness?”

  I had to admit that he was in this case. He had worked too long for a family more particular about their guns than their manners to make any mistakes along that line. If James said the gun was fully loaded when he gave it to Tom, then fully loaded it was.

  While I was frankly confiding my opinion to Lyttle, I heard a shot ring out. I paused in my conversation, startled and afraid.

  “Some one is shooting down by the dock,” I said after a moment, moistening my lips with the tip of my tongue. And then before I had ceased speaking, I heard another pistol fired.

  “That is over by the pheasant pens, near the northern boundary,” I almost shouted, turning my face in that direction. The second shot was much louder.

  “Which shot was which?” Lyttle inquired somewhat stupidly, I thought.

  I explained again. “They were both forty-fives,” I added. “The second one was fired close to the house.”

  Lyttle looked at me strangely. “Never mind, Mr. Williams, it was just an experiment my men were making.”

  Reluctantly I settled back in my chair, for I admit I was frightened, but Lyttle took up the conversation where he had left off.

  “You see where I am,” he went on quietly. “Mr. Thomas Evans left this house with a forty-five automatic fully loaded, and he returned with the same gun fired once. You heard one gun fired from the southeast, the spot where Mr. Cyrus Evans’ body was discovered some minutes later, with every indication that he had been killed at the time you heard the shot. I can find no evidence to support the rather unusual story Mr. Thomas puts up to account for his movements, but I have cross-examined you until I am sure you are telling the truth and are going to stick to it. If I accept your evidence, well, I simply have to discard the other.”

  “You found no empty cartridge-case ejected from the gun near where Mr. Thomas says he stood?”

  “No empties have turned up anywhere,” sighed the Sergeant. “I tell you frankly, Mr. Williams, I am up against a case I don’t like at all. I’ve never been assigned to a murder committed at a place like Bayside with people like the Evanses mixed up in it. Talk about a suspected man needing a lawyer, I need one myself.” I laughed at him, but was secretly delighted to think I had his confidence even to this extent. I made another suggestion. “It does look mighty black against Tom, but after all, it is only the evidence of the gun, and the fact you think he put up a thin story to account for himself. You have to have more than bare suspicion to arrest a man of Tom’s caliber.”

  “You think so?” he murmured in a voice more distracted than polite. “Look here, Mr. Williams, there are more than fifteen modern pistols and revolvers in the gun-room downstairs, every one of them in good working order. Now say, for the sake of argument, you were going out to shoot somebody—you know, a tramp, or anybody—would you send upstairs for a special and easily identifiable gun?”

  “There are only three forty-fives down there. I suppose I might send for the gun I liked best.”

  “Why not take Mr. Charles’? He says it was there.” I refused to answer, fearing I was being drawn on a bit by this young man, who only a moment ago seemed to be giving me his confidence. Lyttle continued as if to himself, “Of course, it is possible Charles really had his gun with him yesterday; that young man will have to do some talking in the Coroner’s court before I am really sure of this case. Say, by the way,” he broke off, “every one of these men uses a forty-five. Such a heavy-caliber weapon is an odd preference.”

  I smiled, for I could answer the implied question out of my knowledge of the Evans’ family idiosyncrasies and I was glad to divert Lyttle’s mind from the course of thought he was pursuing.

  “Like the Canadian Mounties they get their man. They rarely use a forty-five for target shooting any more, but if they go about armed it would never by any chance be with a lighter caliber.”

  The policeman frowned in bewilderment, “I don’t see why.”

  “Do you know why the Army uses a Colt Automatic forty-five caliber pistol as regulation gun?”

  Lyttle shook his head.

  “Well, then, here’s the story and it is a true one. Years ago the Army thought that a thirty-eight revolver was large enough to stop a man and stop him quickly. There was some difference of opinion, some officers maintaining they should have a more powerful gun, but it took a little brown man in the Philippines to settle the question. He ran amuck. He slithered into an evening crowd with a two-foot bolo, cutting, slashing and gibbering. The screams of the women attracted the attention of an Army officer quartered in that section of the town, a friend of mine by the way, and he ran out with his regulation thirty-eight. He fired three shots and hit his man three times in the body and couldn’t stop him; then he threw the gun at him, dodged the bolo and grappled with him. They fell to the ground and the officer hammered him over the head with a stone; they rolled into the stagnant water of a dirty drainage ditch and the harrassed Captain held his opponent’s head under. The native died from drowning, not from bullet wounds.”

  Lyttle looked at me for a space of time. “I see your point,” he remarked thoughtfully. “If Mr. Evans was going after a hard-boiled killer, he would get the largest gun he had, something that fired a heavy bullet. Well, I shall spend the rest of the day looking for the person he says he fired on; after that, it is up to the Coroner.”

  After the Sergeant had left me, I wandered down to the gun-room, for I felt that was headquarters and I would get the first news of any new developments if I remained there. Before long Edwin strolled in.

  “Well, Williams, nice mess you’ve landed in.”

  I agreed and he went on, “Still stick to your story about the one shot?” Apparently every one knew about my dilemma. “It is mighty tough on Tom, you know.”

  I couldn’t see what else I could do, save abide by the tale I had already told, and I said so. “I am honestly as much surprised as any one that I didn’t hear the other two shots,” I concluded.

  “It doesn’t seem possible,” Edwin remarked idly.

  “No, it doesn’t,” said another voice dryly. Charles came in the door. “Where is Tom this morning, anyhow?”

  “Last I saw of him he was down by the dock, examining the lay of the land,” Edwin replied.

  “Still down there, I guess, then,” said Charles lazily. “I was down there myself for a while. They seem to think the villain in the plot stood behind the wood-pile to fire, so they took the whole thing to pieces to see if he’d left his name written on it anywhere. I left for fear they might put me to work putting it together again. Tom turned to and worked like a Trojan, but not so me—I am content with my role of humble onlooker. Say, how does one work like a Trojan, anyhow? Weren’t they the johnnies who captured the beauteous Helen? Just where did the idea of work get connected with them, do you suppose?”

  “Here comes Tom now,” I interrupted the classical reverie hastily, glancing out of the window. Charles came to my side and opened the French doors to let his cousin in.

  “Hello, old man, still pursuing your friend, Hirstein?”

  Tom frowned heavily. “Look here, Charles, this is no subject for jest. It’s up to all three of us to get out there and give the police as much help as we can.”

  Edwin looked up. “I wonder how much help you’d lik
e to have us give them really?”

  “What do you mean by that?” Tom asked sharply.

  Charles intervened with glee. “Edwin never means anything—verbal evasion is his specialty. I’ll tell you one thing, though, Thomas, old scout, you sure got an awful break when you identified your dueling opponent as Hirstein. We might be able to get together and convince the police that our honored guest, Bob Williams, is totally deaf and had mislaid his ear trumpet this trip, and get around his evidence that way, but it sure was careless of you to pick a man already in jail and swear it was he at whom you were shooting.”

  Tom was angry now, so angry he failed to realize that a fifth person had joined us. Sergeant Lyttle stood in the doorway, listening to every word.

  “Now get this straight, you two human sponges; you are taking it for granted I shot the old man. I’m not so dumb, I tell you, but, even if I were, you can cut out this line of chatter if you know what is good for you. You both know how the will reads—I’m master here at Bayside and you can act accordingly, or get out damned quick.”

  “I’m not so sure you’re master here now,” sneered Edwin. “Bayside won’t do you much good if you get in jail over this thing.”

  “I’m not going to jail,” Tom shouted. “And even if I did go, I wouldn’t be there long, and I’d see to it you weren’t in Bayside when I got back.”

  “If you go to jail,” mocked Charles, “it will certainly add to the distinction of the family. The old man had the devil’s own time keeping my sacred brother from behind the bars—”

  “Shut up,” snapped Edwin. “You can’t say anything while you have that gang of bootleggers hanging around. I’ve been expecting trouble of one sort or another for a long time. If you choose your friends from the jailbirds, you mustn’t be surprised if people connect you with what happened yesterday.”

  “Same to you handsome,” returned Charles airily. “Banker or bootlegger, what matter if neither of us was around here yesterday?”

  Lyttle turned to leave the room and I followed his good example. Acrimonious words from the gun-room floated down the hall after us. I mopped my brow. What must the police think of a family scene like the one back there? Moreover, I wasn’t at all sure that neither Charles nor Edwin had been on hand at the time of the murder, and I knew their motives might well have been as strong as Tom’s, provided my guess as to the motive were correct. If it hadn’t been for Tom’s ridiculous story of the tramp—I shook my head and buried myself in the library to pass the time until tomorrow’s inquest.