The Paliser case Part 40

"To defend him? Dunwoodie. Ogston told me. Ogston says----"

"I daresay he does. His remarks are always very poignant."

"But look here. Before the arrest was known, Ogston was in this room telling everybody that, last night, he gave Lennox a seat in Paliser's box. He will have to testify to it. He can't help himself."

"Perhaps I can help him though. I was with Lennox at the time."

"You were? That's awkward. You may have to corroborate him."

"I certainly shall. I have the seat."

"What?"

"Lennox dropped the ticket. After he had gone, I found it on the floor.

It is in my shop now."

"Well, well!" Verelst astoundedly exclaimed. "But, here, hold on. The papers say he had a return check."

Jones flicked his ashes. "I have one or two myself. Probably you have.

Even otherwise return checks tell no tales, or rather no dates."

"I never thought of that."

"Think of it now, then."

"Yes, but confound it, there is the stiletto."

"As you say, there it is and I wish it were here. It is mine."

Verelst adjusted his gla.s.ses. "What are you talking about?"

"The war," Jones answered. "What else? In my shop last evening, Lennox was drawing his will. In gathering up the sheets, the knife must have got among them and, without knowing it, he carried it off. This morning I missed it. The loss affected me profoundly. It is an old friend."

"You don't tell me."

"Don't I? I'll go so far as to lay you another basket of pippins that the police can't produce another like it. On the blade is inscribed Penetrabo--which is an endearing device."

"But see here," Verelst excitedly exclaimed. "You must tell Dunwoodie.

You----" In sheer astonishment he broke off.

Innocently Jones surveyed him. "You think it important as all that?"

"Important? Important isn't the word."

With the same air of innocence, Jones nodded. "I thought it wasn't the word. I should have said trivial."

"But----"

Wickedly Jones laughed. "If you feel reckless enough to go another basket of pippins, I will wager that if I tell Dunwoodie anything--and mind the 'if'--he will agree that the paper-cutter is of no consequence--except to its lawful owner, who wants it back."

"But tell me----"

"Anything you like. For the moment, though, tell me something."

"What?"

Jones blew a ring of smoke. "Do you happen to know whether Paliser had anything?"

"What on earth has that to do with it?"

Jones blew another ring. "I had an idea that his mother might have left him something. You knew her, didn't you? Any way, you still know M. P.

Did he ever say anything about it?"

"He did not need to. It was in the papers. He made over to him the Splendor, the Place, and some Wall Street and lower Broadway property that has been part of the Paliser estate since the year One."

"What is it all worth?" Jones asked. "Ten or twenty million?"

"Thirty, I should say. Perhaps more. But what has it to do with Lennox?"

Negligently Jones flicked his ashes. "Well, it changes the subject. I can't talk about the same thing all the time. It is too fatiguing."

As he spoke, he stood up.

Verelst put out a hand. "Dunwoodie is sure to look in. Where are you off to?"

Jones smiled at him. "I am going to gaze in a window where there are pippins on view."

"Go to the devil!" said Verelst, who also got up.

Fabulists tell strange tales. It is their business to tell them. Jones had no intention of looking at pippins. What he had in mind was fruit of another variety. It was some distance away. Before he could make an appreciable move toward it, Verelst, who had turned from him, turned back.

"There!"

Beyond, through the high-arched entrance, a man was limping. He had the battered face of an old bulldog and the rumpled clothes of a young ruffian.

"There's Dunwoodie!"

Verelst, a hand on Jones' elbow, propelled him toward the lawyer, who gratified them with the look, very baleful and equally famous, with which he was said to reverse the Bench.

But Verelst, afraid of nothing except damp sheets, stretched a hand.

"You know Ten Eyck Jones. He has something very important to tell you."

"Yes," said Jones. "In March, on the eighth or ninth, I have forgotten which, but it must be in the 'Law Journal,' a decision was rendered----"

He got no farther. Other members, crowding about, were questioning, surmising, eager for a detail, a prediction, an obiter dictum, for anything they could take away and repeat concerning the murder, in which all knew that the great man was to appear.

But Dunwoodie was making himself heard, and not gently either. It was as though already he was at the district attorney's throat.