Part 28

The result was a sort of pocket in the curtain, concealed on the chintz side, which was the side which would hang toward the room.

“Probably,” he said, “the curtain would have been better. It would have stayed anyhow. Whereas the bag--” He was flushed with triumph. “How in the world would Hawkins know that?” he demanded. “You can talk all you like. She’s told us things that no one ever told her.”

Before examining the floor in the hall I went downstairs and listened outside the kitchen door. The watchman was stirring inside the room, and groaning occasionally. Sperry, however, when I told him, remained cool and in his exultant mood, and I saw that he meant to vindicate Miss Jeremy if he flung me into jail and the newspapers while doing it.

“We’ll have a go at the floors under the carpets now,” he said. “If he gets noisy, you can go down with the fire-tongs. I understand you are an expert with them.”

The dressing-room had a large rug, like the nursery above it, and turning back the carpet was a simple matter. There had been a stain beneath where the dead man’s head had lain, but it had been scrubbed and scraped away. The boards were white for an area of a square foot or so.

Sperry eyed the spot with indifference. “Not essential,” he said. “Shows good housekeeping. That’s all. The point is, are there other spots?”

And, after a time, we found what we were after. The upper hall was carpeted, and my penknife came into requisition to lift the tacks. They came up rather easily, as if but recently put in. That, indeed, proved to be the case.

Just outside the dressing-room door the boards for an area of two square feet or more beneath the carpet had been scraped and scrubbed. With the lifting of the carpet came, too, a strong odor, as of ammonia. But the stain of blood had absolutely disappeared.

Sperry, kneeling on the floor with the candle held close, examined the wood. “Not only scrubbed,” he said, “but scraped down, probably with a floor-scraper. It’s pretty clear, Horace. The poor devil fell here. There was a struggle, and he went down. He lay there for a while, too, until some plan was thought out. A man does not usually kill himself in a hallway. It’s a sort of solitary deed. He fell here, and was dragged into the room. The angle of the bullet in the ceiling would probably show it came from here, too, and went through the doorway.”

We were startled at that moment by a loud banging below. Sperry leaped to his feet and caught up his hat.

“The watchman,” he said. “We’d better get out. He’ll have all the neighbors in at that rate.”

He was still hammering on the door as we went down the rear stairs, and Sperry stood outside the door and to one side.

“Keep out of range, Horace,” he cautioned me. And to the watchman:

“Now, George, we will put the key under the door, and in ten minutes you may come out. Don’t come sooner. I’ve warned you.”

By the faint light from outside I could see him stooping, not in front of the door, but behind it. And it was well he did, for the moment the key was on the other side, a shot zipped through one of the lower panels. I had not expected it and it set me to shivering.

“No more of that, George,” said Sperry calmly and cheerfully. “This is a quiet neighborhood, and we don’t like shooting. What is more, my friend here is very expert with his own particular weapon, and at any moment he may go to the fire-place in the library and--”

I have no idea why Sperry chose to be facetious at that time, and my resentment rises as I record it. For when we reached the yard we heard the officer running along the alley-way, calling as he ran.

“The fence, quick,” Sperry said.

I am not very good at fences, as a rule, but I leaped that one like a cat, and came down in a barrel of waste-paper on the other side. Getting me out was a breathless matter, finally accomplished by turning the barrel over so that I could crawl out. We could hear the excited voices of the two men beyond the fence, and we ran. I was better than Sperry at that. I ran like a rabbit. I never even felt my legs. And Sperry pounded on behind me.

We heard, behind us, one of the men climbing the fence. But in jumping down he seemed to have struck the side of the overturned barrel. Probably it rolled and threw him, for that part of my mind which was not intent on flight heard him fall, and curse loudly.

“Go to it,” Sperry panted behind me. “Roll over and break your neck.”

This, I need hardly explain, was meant for our pursuer.

We turned a corner and were out on one of the main thoroughfares. Instantly, so innate is cunning to the human brain, we fell to walking sedately.

It was as well that we did, for we had not gone a half block before we saw our policeman again, lumbering toward us and blowing a whistle as he ran.

“Stop and get this street-car,” Sperry directed me. “And don’t breathe so hard.”

The policeman stared at us fixedly, stopping to do so, but all he saw was two well-dressed and professional-looking men, one of them rather elderly who was hailing a street-car. I had the presence of mind to draw my watch and consult it.

“Just in good time,” I said distinctly, and we mounted the car step. Sperry remained on the platform and lighted a cigar. This gave him a chance to look back.

“Rather narrow squeak, that,” he observed, as he came in and sat down beside me. “Your gray hairs probably saved us.”