The Mystery of the Hidden Room

by Marion Harvey

  CHAPTER XXXIX

  CONCLUSION

  Leaving Jones in charge of the house and its gruesome burden, McKelvie,Grenville and I drove to Center Street to secure Ruth's release. On theway Grenville asked McKelvie whether he would mind explaining how hefirst divined the truth. McKelvie obligingly complied.

  "I owe my success to Miss Manning's quick-wittedness in leaving us thatclue in the secret room. But for that the case might still be hangingfire. Until we discovered the ring I had no suspicions of the real truthof the matter. I merely mistrusted Cunningham, because he was the onlyclever unprincipled person connected with the case, but I could conceiveof no plausible motive which would cause him to commit the crime.

  "I had never swallowed that neat account of how Darwin's finger came tobe bruised. The reason was deeper than mere sentiment, I felt. When westumbled on the ring, the truth flashed across my mind. The ring had tobe removed because the dead man was Dick, not Darwin. If that were so,then Dick could not have committed suicide. I determined to test mytheory.

  "I took with me to Water Street a photograph of Darwin taken when he wasDick's age (I had seen it in an old album in the den upstairs when Ifirst examined the house on Riverside Drive). Both Mrs. Bates and BenKite recognized it as the picture of the man who had jumped into theriver. So far, so good. Dick had been murdered and Darwin was alive.What was the motive? James Gilmore supplied the answer and the case wassimplified. With Darwin as the murderer every fact fell into place withthe ease of a carefully pieced puzzle.

  "Darwin wanted to rid himself of his wife, Darwin knew she had written alove-letter, Darwin knew that Mr. Davies was in the house and would urgeMrs. Darwin to secure the epistle. Also the quarrel with Lee took on anew phase, a scheme for ridding himself of a pair of keen eyes.

  "The only question to be solved was the one, Where was Darwin? Was hestill in the city or had he left the country? I could not rid myself ofthe idea that Cunningham had some share in the affair. He was too keenlyinterested to be a mere on-looker. Could it be that Cunningham wasDarwin, I asked myself. I investigated and discovered that the two menwere never in the city at the same time, that they had never been seentogether, although they were more than lawyer and client. The finding ofthe one hundred and fifty thousand dollars in Cunningham's strong boxclinched the matter for me. I knew that Darwin was not likely to giveanother man the money which he would need himself with which to getaway."

  McKelvie paused and turned to me. "Do you remember the night he told usthat pleasant fiction about the one hundred and fifty thousand dollars?I was positive then that he was Darwin, but I had no way of proving itand I had no desire to put him on his guard. That is why I advertisedfor Lee. I wanted to frighten him into thinking I was on to him and socatch him with the goods, which we were able to do, thanks to his ownfolly."

  "And thanks to you, Mrs. Darwin's life has been saved," I said, as heceased speaking. "I can never repay you for what you have done," and Iheld out my hand.

  He grasped it with an embarrassed laugh. "Don't thank me. I enjoyedrunning him to earth. I'm glad he got his deserts."

  "Did he really mean to kill himself?" I asked presently.

  "No. I examined that closet. It had a double purpose. There was atrapdoor in the ceiling as well, and when you pressed a button in thewall a ladder was let down and you could escape over the roof. That wasDarwin's plan, but in his haste he touched the wrong spring, for theywere near together and it was dark, and so he fell to his death. Thus isevil punished in the end."

  "How did Cunningham happen to have a sachet bag embroidered with hisinitials when Cora did not know him as Cunningham?" I inquired.

  "He had foolishly preserved the one she had given him as Darwin. Theinitials on it were P. D."

  "You told me that when I learned the answers to those questions that Ishould know who committed the crime. Why was it then that Jones and Idid not guess the truth the night we heard Lee's story?"

  "Because you had no idea of the motive for the crime. Also you answeredsome of the questions wrong," he replied with a smile.

  "Wasn't it odd that Ruth failed to recognize Cunningham as her husbandwhen he spoke to her at the inquest?" I asked.

  "No. He kept his voice disguised. Didn't he say he had a bad cold orsomething of the sort? When I was positive that Cunningham was Darwin Ihad a second interview with Mrs. Darwin. She told me then that whenCunningham spoke to her she had an impression that she was hearing thevoice of her husband, but as she was persuaded that Darwin was dead shethought it must be her own foolish fancy, and so said nothing about it."

  I nodded, recalling the puzzled look on Ruth's face when she glanced atCunningham at the inquest, for which I had at the time been unable toaccount, and while I waited McKelvie's return in the reception room ofthe Tombs, I pondered upon the kindness of Fate in having disposed ofthe man who had stood so long between me and the one desire of my heart.I wondered how I would tell Ruth the actual facts in the case, and wasdebating the wisdom of enlightening her when McKelvie returned with abeaming smile.

  "She'll be here in just a minute," he said, adding quizzically, "Youwon't need my help in solving this problem, I'll wager," and he wavedhis hand toward the door.

  The next moment Ruth was in my arms.