CHAPTER X
Was It Supernatural?
Late that afternoon Braye returned from New York. He looked weary and exhausted, as if under hard and continuous strain.
Norma and Eve had both been watching for him from different windows and met on the stairs in their sudden rush to meet him in the hall.
It was easily apparent that both girls desired to see him first and tell him the further awful development of the disappearance of Vernie’s body.
“What!” he exclaimed, “more horrors! Wait a minute, till I get off this dust coat.”
Before Eve or Norma could say more, the others, hearing Braye, came trooping to the hall, and all began to talk at once.
“I can’t understand – ” and Braye wearily passed his hand across his brow, – “tell me all that happened after I left last evening.”
“Nothing especial,” said Tracy, quietly. “We all went to bed early, at least, we went to our rooms. Professor Hardwick and I sat up half the night, talking. But we left Thorpe on guard in the hall here, and of course, it never occurred to any of us there was need of further precaution.”
“Nor was there,” said Eve, fixing her great eyes on Braye. “Nobody could possibly come in from outside and take that child away. The house is too securely locked for that, as we all know.”
“Why should any one want to?” queried Braye, his face blank with amazement.
“No one did want to, – no one did do it,” returned Eve. “You must admit, Rudolph, that the whole thing is supernatural, – that – ”
“No, Eve, I can’t do that.” Braye spoke positively. “When I’m up here with you psychists, and in this atmosphere of mystery, – and Lord knows ‘Black Aspens’ is mysterious! – I get swayed over toward spiritualism, but when I go down to the city and talk with rational, hard-headed men, I realize there’s nothing in this poppycock!”
“Oh, you do!” and Eve’s penetrating glance seemed to bore into his very soul, “then, pray, how do you explain the fact that Vernie – isn’t there?”
“I don’t know, Eve, – I don’t know. But some fiend in human shape must have managed to get into the house – ”
“And get out again?” said Tracy, “and carry the body with him, – when Thorpe sat right here in the hall – ”
“Where was Thorpe?” asked Braye, suddenly.
“In a chair there, by that table,” and Eve indicated a position well back in the great hall.
“Then he couldn’t see the doors of both rooms – ” began Braye, but Professor Hardwick interrupted: “Nonsense, man, both doors were open, if any move had been made, Thorpe must have heard it.”
“Both doors open,” said Braye, “Norma, you said they were closed when you came down to breakfast.”
“I asked Thorpe about that,” said Tracy. “He told me that at daybreak, or soon after, he closed the doors, without looking in the rooms. He was scared, I think, though he won’t admit that. He says, he thought the ladies would be coming down and the doors better be closed.”
“That’s all right, but it’s strange that he didn’t glance into the rooms.”
“I don’t think so,” said Landon. “Thorpe was in charge, but he had no reason to think there had been any disturbance, and he is pretty well scared up over the whole matter. And I don’t wonder.”
“Nor I,” said Braye. “It’s all inexplicable. What’s Crawford going to do next?”
“I’m not sure,” said Tracy, “but I think he’ll hold an inquest. Of course, he thinks it’s a case of murder – ”
“How absurd!” cried Eve. “What more does the man want in confirmation of the supernatural? First, those two deaths, impossible of human achievement, and now, the taking away of poor little Vernie, in circumstances that deny any mortal hand in the matter!”
“If that’s true, Eve,” Braye spoke in a matter-of-fact tone, “it will do no harm to let the coroner proceed along his own lines. He can’t convict a murderer if there isn’t one, – and if there is one, we all want him convicted, don’t we?”
“Of course,” said Landon, “but suppose they pitch on an innocent man?”
“It’s all supposition,” declared Braye. “I never heard of such a moil! I can’t see how it can be murder, or body-snatching, yet I can’t stand for ghost-work, either. Say it’s murder, – where’s a motive, for anybody?”
“I think you ought to know, Rudolph,” Eve said, slowly, “that that Crawford person asked who would inherit Mr. Bruce’s money, and – ”
“And we owned up that you were the next of kin, old chap,” put in Landon, smiling grimly. “Any remarks?”
“Don’t be flippant, Wynne,” said Braye, seriously, “of course, I’ve thought of that. I can’t very well be charged with the murder, as I wasn’t here at the time, but I do feel deeply embarrassed at the thought that I am, without a doubt, the next heir. That can, I suppose, draw suspicion on me, as I may be said to have motive. But I am not afraid of that, for there’s no possible way I could have turned the trick. But, if it was murder, if there’s the slightest indication of foul play, I’m ready to devote all of Uncle Gifford’s money, if need be, in bringing the criminal to justice.”
“Of course, there’s no sense in tacking the crime on you, Braye,” and Landon sighed. “If it was a crime, and if anybody here committed it, they’ll more likely suspect me, for I’m the next heir after you, and if I could despatch two intervening heirs, I could also bump you off, I suppose.”
“Don’t talk like that, Wynne,” implored Milly. “It’s not like you, and I – ”
“I’m only preparing you, Milly, dear, for what may come. That mutton-headed coroner can’t rest till he fastens murder on somebody, – and it might as well be me.”
“I want to go home, Wynne, – I want to go back to New York,” and Milly began to cry.
“You may, dear, just as soon as you like. But I must stay and see what happens up here. For me to run away would be, to say the least, suspicious.”
“Talk sense, Wynne,” broke in Braye; “I wasn’t here, you know, when those two people died. Tell me again, just where were you all?”
“Mr. Bruce and Professor Hardwick sat in those two chairs, confabbing,” Wynne explained; “I was passing things round, so was Mr. Tracy. Eve was running the tea things, Vernie was jumping about here and there, and Norma, – where were you, Norma?”
“I was near Mr. Bruce and the Professor, listening to their talk,” she returned. “I was greatly interested. Mr. Landon had just given me a cup of tea, and I was sipping it as I listened. There was nothing wrong about the tea, of that I’m certain.”
“Of course there wasn’t,” agreed Braye, who had heard the scene rehearsed many times. “There’s nothing wrong anywhere, that I can see, except that a dreadful thing has happened, and we must find out all we can about it. I’ve been to see Uncle Gif’s business friends, he has a few in New York, and they’re flabbergasted, of course. One of them, a Mr. Jennings, is sure it’s a desperate murder, cleverly contrived by some people in Chicago, who are enemies of Uncle’s, and who, he says, are diabolically ingenious enough to have brought it about. He holds that Vernie’s death was accidental, – I mean that they only intended to kill Uncle Gifford. I can’t believe in this talk, for how could it have been brought about? But Jennings thinks it was through the servants, – and that they’re really enemies in disguise.”
“Why, they’re all natives of this section,” exclaimed the Professor, “how could they be implicated?”
“I told Jennings that, but he thinks they’ve been bought over, or – oh, Lord, I don’t know what he thinks! I don’t know what to think myself! There’s no solution!”
“Don’t think now, Rudolph,” and Eve came over to his side, and took his hand in hers. “You’re all tired out, and I don’t wonder. Let’s have tea, – we mustn’t dread tea because of its associations, – if we do that, we’ll all collapse.”
With a determined air, Eve went away to order tea served as usual, though Milly had declared she never wanted to have it in that hall again.
But Eve’s idea found favour with the rest, and they gratefully accepted the refreshment, which, until that awful afternoon, had been such a pleasant function.
“We must settle some things,” Braye said, looking at Landon. “I arranged to send the bodies to Chicago, – of course, I didn’t know – ”
“Isn’t it terrible!” exclaimed Norma. “What shall you do now?”
“I think I’ll send Uncle Gif’s body, at once, and hope to find Vernie’s later. It must be found – ” Braye looked about wildly. “I wish I had been here last night! Oh, forgive me, I’m not casting any hint of blame on you others, but, – well, you know I wasn’t here when – when it happened, either, and I can’t sense it all as you do. Professor Hardwick, what do you think about it all?”
“I’m an old man, Braye, and I’ve had wide experience, also, I’m a hard one to convince without strong and definite proof, but I’ll state now, once for all, that I’m a complete convert to spiritism and I believe, – I know, – these deaths of our friends were the acts of an inimical spirit, a phantasm, incensed at our curiosity concerning the occult, and our frivolous attitude toward the whole subject.”
“You really believe that, Professor?”
“I really do, Braye, and moreover I am convinced that the disappearance of – of little Vernie, is the work of the evil spirit. What else can explain it?”
“Nothing that I know of, but I can’t swallow the idea of a disembodied spirit making off with a real, material body! I wish I’d been here! Didn’t anybody see or hear anything?”
“No,” declared Landon, but Norma gave a quick glance at Eve, who returned it with a defiant toss of her Titian-coloured head.
“Why do you look at me like that, Norma?” she asked, shortly.
“Why do I?” Norma repeated in a soft significant tone. “I think you know, Eve.”
“Well, I for one, shall stay up here for a time, and see how matters go on,” said Braye, with sudden determination. “Who else wants to stay?”
“I do,” said Professor Hardwick, “I think we’ve by no means seen the last of the manifestations, and though I feel there is a danger, I am ready to brave it for the sake of investigating further.”
“I don’t want to stay,” and Milly shook with nervous apprehension. “Can’t we go home, Wynne?”
“Very soon, darling. You can go at once, and I’ll follow as soon as things are adjusted up here. I think none of us ought to seem to run away.”
“Certainly not,” Tracy agreed, promptly. “The whole affair is so astounding, I can scarcely get my wits together, but I see clearly, no one must leave this house, until we are all exonerated from suspicion.”
“Not even me?” asked Milly, tearfully.
“That’s for you and Mr. Landon to decide,” returned Tracy, gently. “I’m not dictating, not even advising, but I have strong opinions on the subject. What say, Braye?”
“I quite agree with you, Tracy. But, I’m sure if Mrs. Landon prefers to go down to New York and stay at her mother’s no one could possibly object.”
“But I don’t!” Milly surprised them all by saying, “if you put it that way, – if it’s cowardly to go away, I don’t want to go. I want to stay, if Wynne does, and if Eve and Norma stay.”
“That’s my brave girl,” and Landon smiled at his wife; “I’ll guarantee that Milly won’t make any trouble, either. Once she’s awake to a duty, she’s bold as a lion. Now, see here, if Crawford stirs up suspicion of any of us, we’ll have to deal with him pretty roughly, I fear. He’s a pig-headed sort, and he will move heaven and earth to gain his point. Moreover, we can’t expect him to subscribe to spook theories, any more than those men Rudolph talked to in New York. One has to go through some such experiences as we have, to believe in them. You, Professor, would never have been convinced by hearsay evidence, would you?”
“No, sir, I would not! It took these otherwise inexplicable happenings to prove to me that there is but one way to look. Even a coroner can’t produce a human criminal who could kill those two people the way they were killed, and who could get into and out of this house and take a human body with him! The thing is preposterous!”
“You know the doors and windows were all locked?” asked Braye, thoughtfully.
“I looked after them, myself,” said Landon. “I always do. After the last one goes upstairs for the night, I invariably look after the locking up. And the house, properly locked, is impregnable. The servants’ quarters are shut off and locked; there is absolutely no way of getting in from outside.”
“Going back to Jennings’ theory,” mused Braye, “could we suspect old Thorpe?”
“Not for a minute,” declared Landon. “And, too, he wasn’t in the hall when they died. No, I’d trust Thorpe as far as I would any of ourselves. But, there’s Stebbins. I’ve never felt sure that he’s entirely trustworthy.”
“Even so,” said Braye, “he wasn’t here when – when they died.”
“No, he wasn’t. I can’t see any way he could have arranged things unless he poisoned the cake – ”
“Rubbish, Wynne!” cried Eve, “you know we all ate that cake. Do be rational.”
“But Mr. Bruce was poisoned, Eve, we can’t get away from that.”
“Of course he was,” broke in Hardwick, “and doubtless Vernie was too, but it was not done by human agency.”
“Well, there we go, reasoning round in a circle,” murmured Norma; “I think our talk is useless, when we surmise and speculate about it all. Let us decide on our immediate plans. Shall you send Mr. Bruce’s body to Chicago, and stay here yourself, Rudolph?”
“Yes, as I look at it now. I can’t see anything else to do.”
Nor was there anything else to do.
For Doctor Crawford persisted in treating the case as a criminal one, and requested that all concerned remain at Black Aspens for the present, with a hint that unless they did so, the request might become a command.
“Then you think the two people were murdered?” asked Landon of the county physician.
“I don’t say that, for sure; but when a man drops dead, and a trace of poison is found in his stomach, it looks mighty like an intention of death on some one’s part, – maybe the man himself. There’s a show of suicide, you know.”
“But Gifford Bruce never would commit suicide!”
“If only those committed suicide who are expected to do so, there’d be mighty few of them. Now, I hold that poison was taken into Mr. Bruce’s stomach while he was eating that cake, or whatever he did eat.”
“We agree to that,” Landon spoke slowly, “but some of us think the poison was put in by supernatural means.”
“Now, ain’t that nonsense, – for reasonable, rational men!” and Crawford’s fine scorn nettled Landon.
“Professor Hardwick doesn’t think it nonsense,” he returned.
The two were alone, Crawford having asked an interview with the man who had rented the house.
“Professor!” and Crawford fairly snorted. “For fool theories, commend me to a college professor. They can’t see two inches either side of their noses!”
“We have had reason to believe in spiritual manifestations,” went on Braye.
“Yes, and who gave you those reasons? Who rented this house to you folks, for the sole purpose of supplying you with a ha’nted house! Who knew that ghosts must be forthcoming, if you folks was to be satisfied? Who performed ghost doings himself, in order that you might not be disappointed?”
“What are you implying? That Mr. – that the owner tricked us?”
“That’s for you to find out. You came up here to investigate, as I understand it. Well, why don’t you investigate? You swallow all them ghosts and ha’ntings, and never look around to see who’s fooling you!”
“But, Doctor Crawford, what you insinuate is not possible. All the strange things we have seen or heard have occurred at night, or, – yes, – occasionally in the daytime, but always when Mr. Stebbins was at his home in East Dryden.”
“How do you know he was?”
“Why, he has never been to the house at all, except two or three times on commonplace errands, since we’ve been here. The supernatural manifestations we have observed had no more to do with him than they had with you!”
“That’s as may be. Only I advise you to investigate with a little common sense and not too much blind faith in your spook visitors. Now, Mr. Landon, I take it you’re boss around here.”
“I’m responsible for the house rent, if that’s what you mean.”
“Well, that’ll do. Now, sir, there’s got to be an inquest. I expected, of course, to hold it on the two bodies, but since one’s gone, we’ll have to do what we can without it. I don’t deny that this case is beyond all my experience. I’ve sent for a detective from New York, and I’ll get all the other help I need. But I’m all at sea, myself, and I make no secret of that.”
“I thought you suspected Eli Stebbins.”
“Not of murder! No, sir! Me’n Eli, we ain’t good friends, haven’t been for years, and I wouldn’t put it past him to play ghost to scare you city people, but murder! Land, no, I wouldn’t ever accuse Eli Stebbins of goin’ that far!”
“Have you any definite suspect?”
“I don’t say as I have, and I don’t say as I ain’t. Truth is, I’m all afloat. I don’t know which way to turn. Every thing’s so awful unbelievable, – as you might say. Now, there’s them two Thorpes. Good, steady-going New England people, they are, and yet, if I had any reason to suspect ’em, I can see myself doing so. But, land, there ain’t a shred of evidence that way. Why, they wasn’t even in the room when the two of ’em died!”
“Wait a minute, Doctor Crawford. Nobody was in the room at the time of those two deaths, but our own party. You don’t suspect one of us, do you?”
“No, Mr. Landon, I don’t. You ain’t a gay crowd, nor yet a fast or a common crowd. You’re all high-toned, quiet, law-abiding citizens, – as I size you up. To be sure, decent citizens have committed murder, but I can’t connect up any one of you with crime in this case. I know Mr. Braye will inherit the money that old Mr. Bruce left, and I know that you’re related there, too, but I haven’t seen one iota of reason to suspect any one of your crowd. If I do, I’ll let you know mighty quick! Nor can I hang it on the Thorpes; nor yet on those girls they have in to help. And that’s what the inquest’s for. To bring out, if possible, some evidence against somebody, so’s we can get a start.”
“I fear you can’t get that evidence, Doctor, for if there were any we would have found it ourselves. You have my good wishes, for if it is a case of murder, committed by a living, human villain, we most assuredly want him apprehended.”
“He will be, Mr. Landon, take it from me, he will be!”
CHAPTER XI
The Heir Speaks Out
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.