burton awoke the next morning in a new frame of mind. his half reluctant interest in the underwood situation had suddenly been touched with enthusiasm. if henry was innocent, then the whole thing was a hideous conspiracy that cried to heaven to be exposed. the fact that it was not taking place in past historic times or in distant lands, but here in a commonplace town of the middle west in the light of newspapers, police regulations and prevalent respectability,--all this made it more interesting to him, instead of more prosaic. it was a real and vital situation, not an imaginable possibility. if henry was in truth innocent, if the doctor was the guileless child of light that he seemed, if miss leslie had been involved in all this tangle by a cruel trick of fate's, then certainly here was work waiting for him. he was no detective, but neither was this the ordinary melodrama of crime. it was rather a psychological problem, and it was just possible that he was better fitted to get at the truth of the matter than a professional who would have less human interest in the persons involved.
first of all, he would see miss hadley. he wanted to verify his guess that henry's presence in the neighborhood last night was something that she could very well explain if she wanted to. and if that proved true, then henry's wanderings on the night of the fire might easily have been in the same direction. burton could not deny that it would ease his mind to have that point settled!
miss hadley came into the reception room with a nervous flutter in her manner and a startled look in her soft eyes. she was a pretty girl, of an excessively feminine type,--all soft coloring and timid grace. certainly she was a pleasant thing to look upon, yet burton's heart rather sank as he stood up to meet her. "she hasn't the backbone to stand by a man," he thought to himself, with a swift recognition of what henry was going to need. but aloud he said: "i took the liberty of calling to inquire about your father. i hope that his trying experiences last night have not had any serious effects."
"he has gone down to the bank," she answered. "he felt that he ought to take the risk."
"risk? what is he afraid of?"
"why, anything might happen, after last night," she said, opening her eyes wide upon him.
"i'm glad to hear you say that," said burton quickly, "because it indicates that you--and i hope your father--do not share the foolish idea that henry underwood was in any way responsible for that outrage."
her eyes filled with quick tears at the name. "they say he did it," she murmured.
"but you don't believe that," he said reassuringly. "you know that he has been arrested and put in jail, yet you say that your father fears other possible attacks. of course if mr. underwood were the one, there would be no further danger, now that he is locked up! so i infer that your father is satisfied that it was some one else."
but anything so logical as this bit of reasoning found no response in miss hadley's mind. she looked at him from brimming violet eyes that, burton confessed to himself with some cynicism, would have made anything like common sense seem an impertinence to him if he had been fifteen years younger.
"papa says that he must have done it," she persisted. "he never did like hen-- mr. underwood."
"but i am sure that any personal dislike will not prevent his being fair to him in a case like this. you can help, you know. you can tell your father quite frankly why mr. underwood was found loitering in the garden. that will clear him of the most serious part of the evidence against him."
"what--what do you mean?" she gasped, looking at him in a kind of terror and half rising, as though she would flee from the room.
"mr. underwood came here last night to see you, didn't he?" he asked, in a matter-of-course tone.
the ready tears overflowed the brimming violets, and though she dabbed them away with a trifle that she called a handkerchief, they continued to well up and overflow, while she kept her eyes fixed upon him.
"i--i was going away. papa said that i had to go to my aunt in williamston, so--that hen-- mr. underwood c--could not come and see me. and he c--couldn't even come to say goodbye, so he came to the garden, and--and--i was afraid some one might see him if he kept hanging around,--it wasn't my fault,--he wouldn't pay attention to me when i told him never to come again,--"
"so you went down to the garden to say goodbye to him," said burton, cheerfully. "well, that was kind of you, and i don't think for my part that you could have done any less. he loves you and you love him and you had a right to say goodbye to him before you went away. of course you would stand up for him, just as he would stand up for you. i understand!"
miss hadley was so surprised by this mode of attack that she could only stare at him in silence.
"now the point that i want you to tell me," burton continued, "is just when you left mr. underwood in the garden and returned to the house."
she continued to stare in fascinated terror.
"you came in through the window in the drawing-room, didn't you?"
she made the slightest possible sign of assent.
"and you went directly up to your room?"
"yes."
"and then when the wind came up you remembered that you had left the window open and you went back to close it. is that it?"
"y--yes."
"and then when you got into the hall, what was it that called your attention to your father's room? was his door open?"
she nodded. "there was a light. i was afraid that he was up and would hear me in the hall, so i peeked through the crack--" she stopped, but she was not weeping now. she evidently saved her tears for her own troubles.
"and then you saw him tied up in bed and you began to scream,--which was the very best thing you could have done, my dear miss hadley. how long were you in your room before you remembered about the window?"
"i--don't know."
"you had not begun to undress."
she gave him a startled look.
"i noticed that you were fully dressed. did you read anything after you went to your room?"
"no."
"or write anything?"
"no."
"or sew, or-- i don't know what girls do do when they go to their room! but did you do anything, and how long did it take you? you see i want to get an idea how long it was between the time you left mr. underwood after saying goodbye to him, and the time that you looked into your father's room."
"i don't know," she wailed, and burton ground his teeth.
"but it may be very important! you must try to remember. it would have taken quite a while for any one to tie all those knots. of course if he was with you in the garden he was not up in your father's room, and if we can prove that there was not time enough--"
but she had sprung to her feet with a little scream. "you don't think he will ever tell that i met him in the garden?"
"aren't you going to tell, yourself?" asked burton dryly.
she began to sob again, more with terror, it seemed, than anything else. "papa would be--so angry."
"but you wouldn't let that frighten you into silence, when your word would mean so much to him?" burton forced himself to speak gently and coaxingly, for he saw that this frightened girl held the key to much of the mystery,--and he doubted her generosity!
"i wish i had--never seen him. i wish he had never come to--the garden. i never wanted him to come!"
"that wasn't the first time he had come, though, was it? you met him in the garden the evening before, you know," burton said. he took a positive tone because he did not dare risk it as a question. but she met his assertion with a look so startled that it was all the confirmation he needed. thank goodness! henry had been here, then, when he came home in the small hours, and there was no further need to wonder about his whereabouts when the sprigg fire started! burton drew a breath of relief.
"i didn't think he would tell," wailed miss hadley.
"he didn't," said burton quickly. "i happened to see him both times; that's how i knew."
"and i never thought he would be so wicked as to tie my father up in knots!"
"but he didn't, my dear miss hadley; you surely knew he didn't. he wouldn't have had time, even if there were nothing else. that's what we can prove, you and i. i want you to tell--"
"oh, i can't! i can't! i'll say i don't know anything about it, if you try to make me tell. i think you are horrid!"
burton beat his mind in despair. how was he to pin this irresponsible child down to the facts of the situation? suddenly she looked up from her handkerchief.
"mr. selby says it was henry, and now i can see what sort of a man he really is."
"when did he say that?"
"last night. and today."
burton reflected that selby certainly knew the advantage of striking when the iron was hot. but he only asked: "is mr. selby a friend of mr. underwood's?"
a self-conscious look came into her face, and she dropped her eyes. it was quite evident that her vanity took the jealousy of the two men as a tribute to her powers.
"does mr. selby know that you are engaged to mr. underwood?" he asked abruptly.
"n--no!" she stammered.
"did you tell him that you had just left mr. underwood in the garden last night?"
"no," she gasped. "you--you don't think mr. underwood would tell?"
"no, i don't think he would," said burton. "in fact, i feel quite sure he would keep silence on that point, at any cost. but i am going to tell, if it becomes necessary."
"i will never speak to him again," she cried desperately. "i will never see him or speak to him again."
burton held himself from retorting: "it will be better for him if you don't," and merely answered, with as much kindliness as he could put into his voice:
"i shall not speak of it unless necessary. if we can clear him without that, all right; i know he would rather have it that way. but if it becomes necessary to prove where he was that evening, in order to prove that he could not have been in your father's room at the same time, i am going to tell the facts. there won't be any harm to you in them. and there isn't anything else to do, if that question comes up."
but miss hadley would not answer. she gave him one look of indignant and tearful reproach, and then fled from the room, leaving him to find his way out of the house as best he could.
burton found himself in a somewhat embarrassing quandary as he considered the matter. while he felt morally satisfied that he had found the true explanation of henry's presence in the neighborhood, and the proof of his innocence of all complicity in the assault upon the banker, he realized that it would not be easy to convince either a prejudiced public or a jury. miss hadley was obviously not to be counted upon. she might deny the whole thing, or she might be terrified into admitting anything as to time and place that the prosecution might wish to draw from her. undoubtedly the opposition of her father would seem to the multitude merely another reason for suspecting henry, instead of its being, as burton saw it, a fairly conclusive proof that he would have been more than ordinarily scrupulous in his dealings with the man whom he hoped to call his father-in-law. and of course henry would neither tell himself, nor thank burton for telling, a piece of news that would be gossip and cause for laughter in a small town like high ridge. it was unfortunate that henry should have fixed his affections upon so unstable a creature as the pretty miss hadley, anyhow. why couldn't he have had the judgment to choose some one like--well, like his sister leslie, who would have walked by the side of the man she loved down into the valley of the shadow of death if need be?
but then, he reflected cynically, people never did show any judgment when it came to falling in love, for the matter of that. there was miss underwood, herself. of course philip was a charming boy, and all that, but--he shook his head impatiently, and went on to interview henry.
