The Further Adventures of Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason\'s Corner Folks

C >> Charles Felton Pidgin >> The Further Adventures of Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason\'s Corner Folks

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17

"Yes, father, but that was a long time ago," said Mary. "Do let
Quincy read the rest of it."

"A brutal murder was committed last night at the Ellicott Mills,"
Quincy continued. "The unfortunate victim was Mr. Samuel Ellicott,
the treasurer and principal owner. He was found sitting at his desk
with his head crushed in. The blood-stained implement of destruction
has been discovered. Robert Wood, Jr., a native of the adjoining town
of Fernborough, has been arrested and held without bail. Young Wood
has been an employee at the mill, but had aspired to the hand of Mr.
Ellicott's only daughter Mabel. Mr. Ellicott was firmly opposed to
the match, and, with the view, probably, of forcing the young man to
leave the city, had discharged him from his employ. Mr. Ellicott was
busily engaged in making preparations for pay day, which occurs to-
day, and was alone in his office at the time. There seems to be no
doubt of the guilt of the accused. His cane was found in Mr.
Ellicott's office and must have been used to inflict the murderous
blows which have deprived Cottonton of one of its most enterprising
and respected citizens."

"What do you think of that, Mary?" asked Quincy.

"I don't know yet. What do you think, father?"

"The case has no mystery--no charm for the detective's mind. I was
thinking that naughty boys who plague little girls often become
wicked men. Now, what do you think?"

Mary did not answer at once. When she did speak it was the result of
deliberation. In a small way she had often tried to help her father
out in solving some of the mysteries that had come up in his line of
work, and now the detective instinct in her was strongly aroused as
Quincy knew it would be.

"Quincy and I both know the young man,--not pleasurably, I'll admit,"
she said, finally. "Everybody thinks him guilty, but we have no right
to join the multitude without cause. He may be innocent. It would be
a double victory to repay an enemy with kindness, and, perhaps, save
an innocent man's life."

"Just what I thought you would say," cried Quincy. "I feel too that
there is a chance that Wood is not the one. But what can we do?" he
continued.

"First, you must go and see Bob Wood's father, Quincy, and tell him
that I am going to investigate the affair, with my father's help. But
tell him he must be quiet about it. If we are to accomplish anything,
it must be done without any one knowing we are interested in the
matter. Father and I will look over all the papers that have reports
of the trial, and, perhaps you had better attend the trial yourself, and
make careful notes, for the papers do not always get things just
straight. Then, I want to see Miss Mabel myself, and see what she
says."

"But, why do you wish to do all this, Mary?" said Mr. Dana. "It
strikes me as being a simple case of a very brutal murder, and one in
which there is no doubt that the authorities have got the right man."

"I don't believe him guilty, that's all."

"That's an opinion,--not a reason."

"I know it, but woman's intuition often comes nearer to the truth
than man's judgment."

She threw her arms about her father's neck, and her eyes looked down
into his, "You'll help all you can, won't you, father?" she pleaded.

"Well, I have nothing else to do, and this affair awakens my
interest. But from what I know of the case now, I think they have the
right man."

"You're a dear, good father to help," and she gave him another
embrace and a kiss.

The next day there was a preliminary meeting which Quincy attended at
Mary's request. It was with difficulty that Mary waited until he made
his report.

"The principal witness was Gustave Pinchot, the night watchman. He
heard loud voices but as Mr. Ellicott was quite deaf he did not
attach much importance to that. Pinchot didn't see anyone come in or
go out."

"Couldn't Bob Wood prove an alibi?"

"Hardly, for he testified that he went to the office that evening,
and Miss Ellicott said that he told her he was going."

"No alibi--and no evidence yet," said Mr. Dana.

"It's coming," said Quincy. "Mrs. Larrabee with whom Wood boarded
testified that he had a heavy oaken staff and that he took it with
him when he went out that evening because he had sprained his ankle."

"Did Mr. Wood acknowledge that the staff was his?"

"He did finally. He injured his case by saying, at first, that he
didn't take it with him, but Mrs. Larrabee's testimony knocked that."

"Is that all the testimony against him?" inquired Mary.

"Oh, no," continued Quincy. "Wood made a damaging statement that will
make it go hard with him. When he asked Ellicott for his daughter's
hand, the old man got mad and threatened to kick him out. Then the
judge asked Wood what he said when Ellicott threatened him and the
young fellow incriminated himself by saying that he told Ellicott if
he did that he would not live to do it again."

"Did it appear that he had been kicked out?" inquired Mary.

"No; and Wood denied it as well."

"And you saw his father, Quincy? What did he have to say?"

"He's all broken up, but says that his son is innocent."

"Of course, that's to be expected," said Mary, and then continued, "I
saw Mabel Ellicott yesterday. She's in love with him, sure, and of
course does not think him guilty. She told me, though, that Bob Wood
had said to her that if she were an orphan there would be no
objection to their marriage."

"That would probably go against him, if the prosecution calls her at
the trial, and she testifies to that. But, what do you really think
about it, Mr. Dana?" asked Quincy.

"I have my suspicions, but I am not going to mention them yet. You
two young people are taking hold of the matter in good shape, and I
want to see what you can do about it; but, although, I do not say
that Wood is not guilty, I do say that I doubt if the government has
sufficient evidence to convict him."

* * * * * * *

Mary became so interested in the case that she decided not to go to
the White Mountains for the summer, and Quincy also remained in
Fernborough, helping Mary as much as he could. Often they would go
off on long tramps in the surrounding country, and once Quincy went
to Boston and was gone several days. That they procured some evidence
was clear from the satisfied remarks made by Mr. Dana, who approved
of the lines on which they were working.

Although they had made some headway they were not ready to present
their theories when the time came for Bob Wood's trial. Many thought
him innocent, but the jury were of a different opinion, and brought
in a verdict of murder in the first degree.

The day after the close of the trial, the district attorney of
Normouth County was sitting in his office opposite the Court House.
He was preparing his address opposing the granting of a new trial,
which he knew would be proposed the next day by the counsel for the
defence.

He had gone over the evidence time and time again. He was a
conscientious man. He felt that the law of the State had been defied--
had been outraged--and yet within his heart was that natural feeling
of sympathy and pity for the unfortunate being for whom but a few
short weeks of life remained, and he could not help regretting the
part he had been obliged to take in convicting the young man.

At that moment, a clerk entered and said that a young lady wished to
see him. In obedience to the direction given, the clerk withdrew; the
door was opened again, and a blue eyed, fair-haired girl entered.
Standing near the district attorney's desk, she said:

"Mr. Harlow, as there is no one here to introduce me, I will
introduce myself. My name is Mary Dana. My father is, or rather was,
a detective for seventeen years in Boston, but our present abiding
place is the town of Fernborough. In the city he often used to tell
me of the cases on which he was working, and I would try to solve
them with him. Robert Wood lived in Fernborough, and from the day of
his arrest I have been much interested in the case, and with the help
of my father and a friend of mine, Quincy Adams Sawyer, the son of
the former governor, I have been trying to find the man who murdered
Mr. Ellicott,--for I have never believed that Robert Wood was the
guilty person." She smiled, and added, "Detectives, I believe, are
more often interested in strengthening evidence, and bringing about
imprisonment and executions than they are in trying to prove people
innocent."

"But, my dear young lady," said the district attorney, "the young man
whom you speak of has already been proved guilty by a fair-minded
jury. There seems to be no question of his being innocent, and, after
the jury have returned their verdict it is rather late to still try
to prove him not guilty."

"What I have to tell you I think is important. Can't you spare me a
little time?"

"I have a luncheon engagement in half an hour, and can give you
twenty minutes, but it will do no good, I am sure. Won't you sit
down?" and Mr. Harlow placed a chair for her near his desk.

"Thank you," said Mary, as she seated herself, "I will be as brief as
possible. I have read of many murder cases, but I believe I never
knew of one in which there was more conclusive evidence against the
person accused than in this instance. When I first took up the case,
my father did not think there was a possible loophole of escape for
him; but the truth does not always appear on the surface. Then,
jurors get wrong impressions. Witnesses are often prejudiced.
Sometimes the judge is not impartial. Then there are coincidences
which are fatal so far as appearances go, but which can be
satisfactorily explained."

The district attorney nodded, somewhat impatiently, and fingered his
watch-chain.

"The day after the murder I called on Mabel Ellicott, primarily to
ask her some questions about Robert Wood, but I also had a chance to
see the body of her father, and to examine the wound upon the
murdered man's head. I decided that Mr. Ellicott had been struck with
something else beside the oaken staff which, covered with blood, was
found near his chair. In fact, I found in the wound certain foreign
substances which could not have formed part of an oaken staff.

"That was a clue, but I told it only to my father and Mr. Sawyer. It
led us to look for something else. I must confess that a week passed
without our discovering anything to bolster up my opinion. Finally,
it occurred to me that perhaps the foreign substances I had found in
the wound might have been on that part of the cane that comes in
contact with the ground. But we will drop that for the present.

"Back of the mill is a piece of sunken ground. During the night,
after Mr. Ellicott was murdered, there was a heavy fall of rain, and
this piece of sunken ground was covered with water to the depth of
several inches, in some places, at least six. I do not mean that the
rainfall was so great, but the water ran down from higher elevations
until it made, what appeared to be, quite an extensive pond.

"Mr. Sawyer and I made several circuits of this temporary pond; why,
I could not exactly tell you. A detective, I have been told, can
seldom tell why he examines certain objects so closely, but something
seemed to draw me towards that improvised lake.

"While looking at the water, I saw something which projected several
inches above its surface, and I had a curiosity to know what it was.
Mr. Sawyer put on a pair of rubber boots, and waded out to it, lifted
it from the water, and found it to be a large, irregular shaped stone
weighing at least ten pounds, which he brought back to me. He then
went back and splashed round in the pond with the hope of finding
something else of interest, but could discover nothing.

"I wondered how that stone came to be in the middle of that pond, and
we devoted several days after that to an examination of the
surrounding country. Back from the mill, some four or five hundred
feet away, was a ledge of rock. We, that is Mr. Sawyer and I, for I
forgot to tell you my father is now a cripple and could only help us
with his advice at home, examined its surface very carefully, using a
magnifying glass and, to my great satisfaction, I finally located a
place into which the stone found in the pond fitted nicely.
Evidently, then, the stone had been detached for some purpose, and
that purpose having been accomplished, the stone had been thrown into
the pond."

The district attorney looked at his watch again and betrayed signs of
uneasiness.

"Pardon me, Mr. Harlow, but would you not rather lose a dinner than
send an innocent man to his death?"

"You still have ten minutes," was the district attorney's reply,
"But, I cannot see the connection between what you are relating and
your idea that Robert Wood is not guilty."

Mary continued her narration.

"I asked Mr. Sawyer to examine the tools and implements in the mill
workshop and he found a pickaxe, one point of which had been
subjected to rather rough treatment. I naturally connected that
pickaxe with the ledge of rock that had been found in the pond.

"An examination of the night watchman's quarters followed. Mr. Sawyer
could discover nothing until he came to a small cupboard which was
locked. Locks, however, do not keep detectives, or criminals either,
from making further investigations. In the cupboard, he found a coil
of rope. There was a certain peculiarity about that rope of which I
will speak later.

"After that Mr. Sawyer loafed around the mill quite a good deal in
the evenings and became acquainted with Mr. Pinchot the night
watchman. He is a French Canadian. He told Mr. Sawyer that his
parents lived in a small town near Montreal, that they were both
quite old and he was their only living son, although he had five
sisters, all working in the States.

"He had saved some money, and as his parents had a farm, and needed
his assistance, he had resigned his position and the day following
the murder was to have been the last one at the mill. He had
withdrawn his resignation when told that the law would require him as
a witness, and has continued in service.

"Mr. Sawyer then made a trip to Boston and found that Mr. Pinchot had
not intended to go to Canada but had been making inquiries as to when
a steamer would sail for France. He had been told he would have to go
to New York. Am I taking up too much of your time, Mr. Harlow?"

"It makes no difference now. I am too late for the dinner. Pray
proceed."

"While in the city Mr. Sawyer called upon the architects who drew the
plans for the Ellicott Mills. I mean the original plan, for many
changes have been made in the interior. He procured a copy of this,
and we found that when the mill was first constructed, the part used
by the treasurer at the time of the murder had been the receiving
room for raw materials. I next made an excuse for us to visit the
mills one Sunday and we investigated the second story of the mill.
The floor was covered with grease and dirt and was black with age. I
got upon my hands and knees and, with my magnifying glass, examined
every foot of the floor.

"For a long time, my search was not rewarded, but, finally, I found a
white place in the wood. A splinter had been detached. With a knife,
I scraped the dirt from the floor. My search was rewarded. I had
found a trap door! Its former use was apparent. On the wall, above
the trap door, was a stout hook. Upon this hook the tackle had been
put and goods lifted from the receiving room to the story above."

"Well what does all this lead up to?" asked the district attorney.

"I will show you very soon, now, Mr. Harlow. If you remember, the
safe at the mill was found open the morning after the murder but had
been closed and locked by the superintendent. This was a very foolish
thing to do, as the combination had been known only to the treasurer,
and it was several days before it was opened by an expert sent by the
manufacturers. It was then found that the money drawn by Mr. Ellicott
for the payroll, some three thousand dollars, had disappeared."

"Yes, I remember," said the district attorney, "the thief was never
found, and with the more important matter of the murder on our hands
little attention was paid to the loss of the money. It was clear from
the start that Robert Wood had nothing to do with it, because
revenge, not robbery was his motive. But, what does all this mean
that you are telling me?"

"I forgot to state, or, rather postponed saying it, that the coil of
rope that was found in the cupboard had a noose in one end of it, and
that in Mr. Ellicott's wound I found small particles of stone. I
summed up the case thus: Pinchot plotted to steal the money drawn for
payday and to kill Mr. Ellicott if it became necessary. He lifted the
trap door, having thrown the noose in the rope over the hook in the
wall. Mr. Ellicott was quite deaf and did not notice the opening of
the trap door or the man's descent by means of the rope. He used the
stone because he could throw it away and no weapon could be found.
The murderer saw the oaken staff. He knew that Mr. Ellicott had a
visitor that evening so he used the staff to complete his deadly work
and left it behind as a witness against an innocent man. He took the
money from the safe, drew himself up by the rope, closed the trap
door, locked up the rope and threw the stone into the pond. In France
he would be safe to spend the proceeds of his crime. A nice bit of
circumstantial evidence, is it not?"

"Then you believe in circumstantial evidence, Miss Dana?"

"In certain cases. But I think it would render the community just as
safe, and be more just to the accused if, in cases of circumstantial
evidence where there is the least doubt, the sentence should be
imprisonment for life with a provision in the law that there should
be no pardon unless the innocence of the life convict was
conclusively proven. When a murderer is taken red-handed, I would not
abate one jot or tittle of the old Mosaic law--an eye for an eye, a
tooth for a tooth, a life for a life. But you know that many
murderers of whose premeditated guilt there could be no doubt have
been much more leniently dealt with by our judges and juries than
those caught in the coils of circumstantial evidence."

"Where is the watchman now?" asked the district attorney.

"Here in Cottonton, but he is intending to leave to-night for New
York, I found out this morning. Of course, he was not able to leave
before this as he had to stay in the vicinity, being a witness at the
trial, but his leaving so soon now simply seemed to confirm my
suspicions, and I thought it time to bring the matter to your
attention."

"Miss Dana," said the district attorney, rising, and holding out his
hand to her. "I have done the best I could to convict Robert Wood of
the murder of Samuel Ellicott, because I really believed him guilty,
and my oath of office bound me to do my duty; but, if he is innocent,
I believe it as much my duty to right the wrong done him. You have
built up a careful case, and I myself shall ask for a stay of
sentence until after this new evidence can be presented to the Grand
Jury. I believe you have saved an innocent man, and I feel your
future as a great detective is assured."

It was unnecessary for Mr. Harlow to apply for stay of sentence in
the case of The Commonwealth of Massachusetts _vs._ Robert Wood.
Within an hour after Mary Dana had left the district attorney's
office, Gustave Pinchot was under arrest, and, sitting in the same
chair which Mary had occupied, was confessing his crime.

The day that Robert Wood was discharged, with no stain upon his name,
Quincy and Mary took her father to Cottonton. At the prison they met
Robert's father who had come to take his son home. He was profuse in
his thanks to Mr. Dana, for to him he considered his son's escape
from death was due.

"You are wrong, Mr. Wood," said Mr. Dana. "Your son owes his life not
so much to me as to my daughter here, and to Mr. Sawyer. She
practically worked up the case herself; I made but few suggestions,
and it was at her request that Mr. Sawyer made certain investigations
that fitted in with her own ideas and made success possible."

"Miss Dana," said young Robert, "a year ago I insulted you, and was
properly treated for my words and actions by Mr. Sawyer. I owe you
both an apology which I now make and ask your forgiveness. But for
you, and Mr. Sawyer, I should have died a felon. You have, indeed,
heaped coals of fire on my head."

Mary answered, "That was forgiven long ago, but if you wish my
forgiveness you have it freely. How does Miss Ellicott feel now that
you are declared innocent?"

"She came to see me this morning and we are to be married as soon as
possible, and I am to become the treasurer of the mill. She will own
three-quarters of the stock."

When Mr. Strout learned that Robert's release was due to the
exertions of Mary and Quincy he sniffed and exclaimed:

"Folks in love will do all sorts of things. She's gone on that young
Sawyer, and she only started in on the thing so she could have a
chance to traipse around the country with him. He'll come back here
for her some day, and her market'll be made. All I hope is that he'll
take her to Boston, or some other foreign place to live an' we shall
see and hear the last of 'em."

CHAPTER XXI

AT HARVARD

The newspapers gave much space to the near approach to miscarriage of
justice in the Wood's case, and many editorials were written on the
fallacy of allowing circumstantial evidence to carry as much weight
as it did. But what was spoken of most was the clever detective work
of Mary Dana. She was the recipient of congratulatory letters for her
work from all parts of the country, and the press could not say too
much in her praise.

Mary received a most flattering offer to join the Isburn Detective
Bureau in Boston. Mr. Irving Isburn, the proprietor of the world-wide
known agency, had for more than fifty years been engaged in solving
mysteries and apprehending offenders against the law. His success had
been phenomenal, and if his agency had been called "The Scotland Yard
of America" it would have been a derogation rather than a compliment.
He had surrounded himself with the most expert men and women in the
profession, and in a letter to Mr. Dana he said he considered Miss
Dana would be a most important and valuable acquisition to his staff.
Mr. Dana, however, decided that Mary was too young to start business
life, so she was sent to Boston to boarding school for a year. At the
expiration of that time she joined Mr. Is burn's staff, and soon that
gentleman wrote her father that in certain lines of investigation she
was unexcelled.

With the coming of autumn, after Bob Wood's release, Quincy and Tom
started in on their four years at Harvard. They had passed their
entrance examinations without conditions, so the few days in the last
of September, spent so anxiously by many of the freshman class in
trying to make up conditions given them the spring before, allowed
Quincy and Tom to live in Arcady until the portals of the temple of
learning were ajar. Rooms were engaged at Beck Hall, and the young
men began their inspection of the classic city on the Charles.

"This city is on the square," remarked Tom. "Lafayette, Central,
Putnam, Harvard, Brattle, and some more on the East side I suppose."

"The college is on the square too," said Quincy, "as long as Dr.
Eliot is Prexie."

College life has been depicted many times in books, and Quincy and
Tom's four years probably contained few events that had not had their
counterparts in the lives of other young Harvard men. They joined
many clubs and societies the initiation ceremonies being, in reality,
a mild form of hazing.

Quincy and his chum were not goody-goody boys, but they had mutually
pledged each other that they would lead temperate lives and refrain
from all dissipation that would prejudice their standing as students.
Quincy saw Mary frequently, and, after she was employed by Mr.
Isburn, they talked over some of the most interesting of Mary's
cases.

In their college life, Tom and Quincy were unsuspecting, and became
the butt of many good-natured and some unkind jokes. On one occasion
they were invited to join a theatre party. It was a variety or
vaudeville show and ended with a pantomime, the closing scene in
which was a skating carnival.

When the skaters came on, the members of the theatre party rose in
their seats and pelted the performers with paper snowballs made hard
by the liberal use of paste. The police were called in. Quincy and
Tom had taken no part in the snowballing but, as examination showed
their pockets were full of the substitutes for the natural product,
they were adjudged as guilty as the others.

One evening Quincy and Tom went to the theatre together. During a
pathetic speech by the heroine the clang of a big cow bell was heard.
The audience vented its displeasure in hisses. Again came the
clangour and all eyes were turned towards the unconscious youths,
Quincy and Tom. Again were the policemen called in. Two young men who
sat behind Quincy and his friend were accused of causing the
disturbance. They indignantly denied any knowledge of it and left the
theatre threatening a suit for damages. Further investigation by the
minions of the law discovered the bell fastened to the hat-holder
beneath Quincy's seat, while the string that served as a bell pull
was under Tom's foot. Denial of such strong circumstantial evidence
was useless and Quincy and Tom promised to cause no further
annoyance. On their way home in the car they discussed the situation.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17