  The days that followed were like an awful nightmare to the people most interested. But at last the inquest was over, the body of Gifford Bruce had been sent to Chicago for burial, and a strange quiet had settled down upon the household at Black Aspens. No new facts had transpired at the inquest. Though the police tried hard to fasten the crime on some individual, there was no definite evidence against any one. All those who had been present at the mysterious death hour, told their stories straightforwardly and unshakably. All agreed as to the circumstances, all remembered and related the story of the Ouija board, which foretold the death of two of the party at four o’clock. “Who was pushing that board?” the coroner asked. “Miss Reid and myself,” Tracy spoke up. “We had been playing with it for some time, and having had only uninteresting and trifling results we were about to lay the thing aside, when the message came that two of us would die the next day at four o’clock. Miss Reid seemed frightened, but I thought at the time she had spelled out the message, herself, to get up a little excitement. However, I took the board away from her at once, feeling that she was carrying a jest too far. I think now, that she was innocent in the matter——” “Well, I don’t,” said the coroner. “If that girl made up that message, she had a reason. Probably she was responsible for both deaths.” “Impossible!” cried Tracy, shocked at this theory. “Why, she was but a child, she had no thought of suicide or—or murder! If she faked the message, it was merely in fun, and because she had tried all evening to get some message of interest. It is quite possible she made up the message, but it is not possible that she did it otherwise than as a jest.” “A gruesome jest!” “As it turned out, yes, indeed. But either it was in jest,—or—the message was from a supernatural source.” Tracy’s eyes were deeply sorrowful, and his face expressed a sort of awed wonder, that made many who were present, think that after all there might be something in these occult beliefs. But not so the coroner. He refused to consider the Ouija message with any serious interest, and continued to ply his witnesses with questions both pertinent and wide of the mark. Elijah Stebbins was put through a grilling inquiry. His manner was that of a guilty man, but no proof of crime could be found in connection with him. The day and hour of the two deaths, he was proved to have been at his home in East Dryden, beyond all doubt. Even granting that the Thorpes, one or both, were in his employ, there was no reason to suspect them. If they had put poison in the cakes or in the tea, it must have been done in the kitchen, and therefore would have affected the whole supply. Suspicion must fall, if anywhere, on the members of the house party who were present at the hour of four o’clock on the fatal day. But these, as has been said, gave so clear a statement of the actual happenings at that hour, that there was no loophole for suspicion to enter. Moreover, the fact that the deaths occurred simultaneously, and just at the foretold hour, seemed to preclude all possibility of any human means being employed. It did look like a supernatural occurrence and many who would have scorned such a belief, were inevitably led to agree that no other theory could explain it. Yet the coroner and his jury were unwilling to admit this, and the verdict was the one most frequently heard of, murder by a person or persons unknown. Indeed, what else could it have been? A coroner’s jury can’t accuse a nameless ghost of two murders, by poison. They pinned their faith to that poison, discovered in the stomach of the body of Gifford Bruce. They assumed that Miss Reid died from the effects of the same poison, but how administered or by whom, or what had become of the body of Miss Reid, they had no idea. But of one thing they were sure, that all these things, and all parts of the complicated crime, were the work of human hands and human intelligence, and that for the reputation of their village and their county and their state, the murderer must be discovered and brought to justice. But how? How find a criminal who gave no signs of existence, and who was, by those most closely concerned, denied actual existence? The detective, one Dan Peterson, proceeded on the theory that a closed mouth implies great secret wisdom. He said little, save to ask questions of everybody with whom he came in contact, and as these questions merely carried him round in a circle back to his starting point, he made little progress. There were also, of course, many reporters, from the city papers, and these wrote up the story as their natures or their chiefs dictated. Some played up the supernatural side for all it was worth, and more; others scorned such foolishness, and treated the affair as a desperate and unusually mysterious murder case. But all agreed that it was the most sensational and interesting affair of its sort that had happened in years, and the eager reporters hung around and nearly drove frantic the feminine members of the house party. At last, Norma and Milly refused to see them, but Eve Carnforth continued to talk with them, and imbued many of them, more or less, with her occult views. “There’s something in what that red-headed woman says,” one reporter opined to his fellow. “She puts it mighty convincing,—if you ask me.” “Yes, and why?” jeered his friend, “because she’s the man behind the ghost!” “What! Miss Carnforth! Guilty? Never!” “I’m not so sure. You know as well as I do, that spook talk is all rubbish, but she’s so bent and determined to stuff it down everybody’s neck, I think she’s hiding her own hand in the matter.” “You do! Well, you’d better think again, before you let out any such yarn as that! Why, she’s a queen, that woman is!” “Oho! She’s subjugated you, has she? Well, look out that she doesn’t convert you to spookism,—you’d lose your job!” Other curious people journeyed up to Black Aspens for the pleasure of looking at the house where the mystery was staged. If allowed to enter they walked about, open-mouthed in admiration or wonder. “Stunning hall!” exclaimed one young man, a budding architect, who examined the old house with interest. “Look at those bronze columns! I never saw such a pair.” “I’ve heard the first Montgomery brought those from Italy or somewhere, and put up a house behind ’em,” volunteered another sightseer. “Ain’t it queer, the way they’re half in and half out of the front wall? Land! You wouldn’t know whether you was going to school or coming home!” and the speaker laughed heartily at his own wit. But at last, the sightseers were refused admittance to the house, and the remaining members of the party gathered in conclave to decide on future plans. Professor Hardwick was the one who showed the calmest demeanour. “If there was a chance of a human being having committed these crimes,” he said, “I’d be the first one to want to track him down, and send him straight to the chair. But nobody who has thought about the matter can present any theory that will account for the human element in the cause of the tragedy. Therefore, feeling certain, as I do, that our friends were killed by supernatural influences, I am ready to stay here a short time longer, in hopes of convincing the authorities up here that we are right. Moreover, I planned to stay here a month, and we’ve been here but little more than a fortnight.” “I’m willing to stay for the same reason, Professor,” and Eve Carnforth’s strange eyes glowed deeply. “I too, know that no living beings brought about the deaths of Mr. Bruce and little Vernie, and I will stay the rest of our proposed month, if the others will.” “I am ready to stay,” said Milly Landon, quietly. “I’ve gotten all over my hysterical, foolish fears, and I want to stay. I have a good reason, and if I hadn’t, I’d be willing to stay to keep house for the rest of you.” “Let’s consider it settled, then,” said Landon, “that we stay a couple of weeks longer. The astute detective, Mr. Peterson, thinks he can round up the villains who did the awful things, and if he can, I’m ready to appear against them.” “We’re all ready to do that,” agreed Mr. Tracy, “and I’ll stay a week or so, but I want to get away by the middle of August.” “That’s nearly two weeks hence,” observed Norma, “I’d like to go home about that time, too. And all that’s to be discovered, which, I suppose, will be nothing, ought to be found out in that time.” “It wouldn’t surprise me to have some further spiritual manifestations,” the Professor stated, with a deeply thoughtful air. “I don’t know why there wouldn’t be such.” “Not with fatal results, I hope,” and Mr. Tracy shuddered. “I hope not, too,” and the Professor looked grave. “But if we receive another warning, I shall go home at once.” “I don’t think we will,” Eve said, “I think there was a reason for the wrath of the phantasms, and now that wrath is appeased. We must not provoke it further.” “You know,” Norma added, “the two who—who died, were scoffers at the idea of spiritual visitations.” “Uncle Gif was,” said Braye, “but little Vernie wasn’t.” “Oh, yes, she was,” corrected Eve. “She made fun of our beliefs all along. And if she really made the Ouija write that message in a spirit of bravado, it’s small wonder that the vengeance reached her as well as Mr. Bruce, who openly jeered at it all.” “I can’t think it,” mused Tracy, “that sweet, lovable child,—full of mischief, of course, but simple, harmless mischief,——” “But, Mr. Tracy,” Norma looked and spoke positively, “it’s easier to think of a supernatural spirit wanting to harm the child, than a living person! What possible cause could a human being have to wish harm to little Vernie Reid?” “That’s true, Miss Cameron. But it’s inexplicable, however you look at it.” “At the same time,” Braye argued, “we must give both sides a chance. If there is any trick or scheme that a man might have used to bring about those deaths at that moment,—I can’t conceive of any, but if there should have been such,—we must, of course, give all possible assistance to Mr. Peterson in his search.” “I’m more than willing,” said Tracy, “I’m anxious to help him for, as you say, Braye, if there’s a human mind capable of devising means to commit such a crime, it surely ought to be within the province of some other human mind to discover it.” “Suppose we start out on that basis,” suggested Braye. “I mean, assume that a live person did the deed, and it’s up to us to find him. Then if we can’t do it, fall back on our occult theories.” “I know where I’d look first,” said Landon, grimly. “Where?” “Toward Eli Stebbins. I’ve always thought he or the Thorpes, or all of them together, know more than we suspect they do. Why, think a minute. Do you remember the first queer, inexplicable thing that happened up here?” “I do,” Eve spoke up. “It was the night we arrived. That battered old candlestick moved itself from Mr. Bruce’s room to Vernie’s.” “Yes, Eve, that’s what I have in mind. Well, I thought then, and I think now, that Stebbins moved that thing himself.” “Why?” asked several voices at once. “I thought I saw him sneaking across the hall that night. And as you know, none of us would have done it, and I don’t think Mr. Bruce did. I thought that at first, but since Mr. Bruce’s death, I know he never played any tricks on us.” “Oh, that doesn’t follow,” objected Hardwick. “I always suspected Bruce would trick us if he could, but when it came to his own death, I’ve no notion that he compassed that!” “No,” agreed Braye, “whatever the truth may be, there was no suicide.” And so they talked, discussed, surmised, argued and theorized, without getting any nearer a positive belief, or proof of any sort to uphold their opinions. Each seemed to have marked out a certain line of thought and doggedly stuck to it. Professor Hardwick was, perhaps, the one most positive regarding supernatural causes, though Eve and Norma were almost equally certain. Braye and Landon were not entirely willing to accept these beliefs, but confessed they had no plausible substitutes to suggest. Tracy, as a clergyman, was loth to accept what seemed to him heathen ideas, but he was more or less influenced by the talk of the Professor and of Eve Carnforth, who was exceedingly persuasive in manner and argument. Milly had little thought of her own about the matter, but was always ready to believe as her husband did, though, she, too, was swayed by the strong statements and declarations of Eve Carnforth. But Dan Peterson paid no more heed to ghost lore of any sort or kind than as if the words had not been spoken. Miss Carnforth’s glib recital of wonders she knew to be true, Miss Cameron’s quiet statements that she vouched for as facts, the Professor’s irascible arguments, all were as nothing to the practical, hard-headed detective. “No, ma’am,” he said to Eve; “it ain’t that I doubt your word, but those things don’t go down. I’ve seen criminals before, try to get out by blaming ghosts, but they couldn’t put it over.” “Are you implying that one of us may be guilty!” cried Eve, really incensed at the thought. “I’m not implying anything, ma’am. I’m investigating. When I find out anything, I’ll accuse, I won’t imply.” The man’s personality was not unpleasant. Of a commonplace type, he went about his business cheerfully, and in a practical, common sense fashion. He examined the great hall, where the deaths had occurred, for a possible secret entrance. “Nothing doing,” was his sum-up of this investigation. “That mahogany wall of the vestibule is as solid as a rock, and nobody could get through those bronze doors when they’re locked and fastened with those bolts!” “Are you assuming that some one entered and killed the victims, as we all sat round drinking tea?” exclaimed the Professor, irascibly. “Not just that, sir,” returned Peterson, gravely. “But somebody might have entered in the night, say, and secreted himself,——” “And then appeared to poison the cake when we weren’t looking!” jeered London. “Well,” and the detective looked a little sheepish, “I got to consider all points, you know. And there don’t seem to be any clues—of any sort.” “No,” said Braye, “no dropped handkerchief or broken cuff-link. Those would be a help, wouldn’t they?” “And then,” Landon went on, “usually, there’s somebody who had a quarrel with the victim, and so, can be duly suspected. But there’s nothing of that sort in this case.” “Nobody at odds with Mr. Bruce, wasn’t there?” asked the detective, hopefully. “Nobody,” declared Landon. “Now you may as well know all there is to know, Peterson. Mr. Braye here, is the heir to Mr. Bruce’s large fortune. After him, I inherit. If these facts are of the nature of straws to show you which way the wind blows, make the most of them. But do it openly. If you suspect Mr. Braye or myself, even in the slightest degree, tell us so. Don’t work behind our backs. We’re ready and willing to help you. That’s so, Braye?” “Rather, Wynne! Moreover, if there’s any way to use it, the fortune of Uncle Bruce is at the disposal of anybody who can bring the criminal to justice. I don’t want the money,—at least, I can’t enjoy it, and don’t want it, considering the way it has come to me. I shall endow a hospital or something with it. For, truly,—I may be foolish, but I can’t seem to see myself living luxuriously on money that has come to me as this has. I don’t wonder that to an outsider, it might look very much as if I had removed these two people in order that I might acquire riches, or, it would have looked so, if I had been here at the time. I doubt if the most fertile imagination can invent a way I could have been the criminal when I was in East Dryden shopping with Mrs. Landon.” “Also, Mr. Peterson,” Landon resumed, “remember that I am the next to inherit, and if I could have compassed the taking off of these two, I could doubtless have later despatched Mr. Braye, and so have come into the fortune myself.” “Wynne,” pleaded Milly, “don’t say those things! They’re too absurd!” “Not that, Milly dear. Mr. Peterson might easily take up some such line of deduction, and while I’m willing he should do so, and proceed in any way he chooses, I repeat that I want him to do it openly, and not try to convict Rudolph or myself, behind our backs. When I proffer him my help, it is in a real and sincere offer of assistance, and I want him to be equally frank and outspoken.” “I guess you’re pretty safe in your attitude,” said Peterson, smiling. “Criminals don’t speak right out in meeting, like that. And I don’t suspect you gentlemen, if you are heirs to the property. I think there’s others to be suspected, and I promise you, sir, if I’m led toward any of your party here, I’ll tell you what I’m up to.” “That’s enough, Peterson, I trust you to keep your word, and you may rely on us to help in any way we can.” And so life at Black Aspens settled down to its former routine, at least in matters of daily household affairs. But the actuating principle of the psychic investigators had changed. Those who thoroughly believed in occultism, sought expectantly for further proofs. Those who were still uncertain, awaited developments. And those who had little or no belief in the supernatural sought some clues or hints that might point to a human criminal. Dan Peterson was among these last. A good, able-minded detective, though not of the transcendental type found in story-books, he worked diligently at his problem, which seemed to him a harder one than he had ever before tackled. His suspicions were all toward the servants of the house, and with these he included Elijah Stebbins. Nor was he illogical in his thoughts. Stebbins was acting queerly. He was frightened at questions, and was difficult to get hold of for an interview. He answered at random, frequently contradicted himself, and showed a positive terror of his own house, since the tragedies there. “If he killed those two people with his own hands, he couldn’t act any different,” Peterson said to Landon, whom he frequently consulted. “But I can’t imagine any way to connect him up with it. He was home in East Dryden when they died, and that’s certain. Now, if he could have made old Thorpe act as his tool—but, Lord, why would he do it, anyhow! It’s too absurd to think Stebbins would want to take those two lives! He wanted you people should be scared, that I’m sure of. He did all he could to scare you,—that I know. But as to killing any of you, I’m sure he didn’t. Howsumever, somebody committed those murders, and I’m going to find out who!” |
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