The Bat Part 36

"I came this evening," he admitted, still hoping against hope that his cringing posture of the servitor might give Beresford pause for the moment.

But the promptness of his answer only crystallized Beresford's suspicions.

"Exactly," he said with terse finality. He turned to the detective.

"I've been trying to recall this man's face ever since I came in tonight--" he said with grim triumph. "Now, I know who he is."

"Who is he?"

Bailey straightened up. He had lost his game with Chance--and the loss, coming when it did, seemed bitterer than even he had thought it could be, but before they took him away he would speak his mind.

"It's all right, Beresford," he said with a fatigue so deep that it colored his voice like flakes of iron-rust. "I know you think you're doing your duty--but I wish to G.o.d you could have restrained your sense of duty for about three hours more!"

"To let you get away?" the young lawyer sneered, unconvinced.

"No," said Bailey with quiet defiance. "To let me finish what I came here to do."

"Don't you think you have done enough?" Beresford's voice flicked him with righteous scorn, no less telling because of its youthfulness. He turned back to the detective soberly enough.

"This man has imposed upon the credulity of these women, I am quite sure without their knowledge," he said with a trace of his former gallantry. "He is Bailey of the Union Bank, the missing cas.h.i.+er."

The detective slowly put down his cigar on an ash tray.

"That's the truth, is it?" he demanded.

Dale's hand flew to her breast. If Jack would only deny it--even now!

But even as she thought this, she realized the uselessness of any such denial.

Bailey realized it, too.

"It's true, all right," he admitted hopelessly. He closed his eyes for a moment. Let them come with the handcuffs now and get it over--every moment the scene dragged out was a moment of unnecessary torture for Dale.

But Beresford had not finished with his indictment. "I accuse him not only of the thing he is wanted for, but of the murder of Richard Fleming!" he said fiercely, glaring at Bailey as if only a youthful horror of making a scene before Dale and Miss Cornelia held him back from striking the latter down where he stood.

Bailey's eyes snapped open. He took a threatening step toward his accuser. "You lie!" he said in a hoa.r.s.e, violent voice.

Anderson crossed between them, just as conflict seemed inevitable.

"You knew this?" he queried sharply in Dale's direction.

Dale set her lips in a line. She did not answer.

He turned to Miss Cornelia.

"Did you?"

"Yes," admitted the latter quietly, her knitting needles at last at rest. "I knew he was Mr. Bailey if that is all you mean."

The quietness of her answer seemed to infuriate the detective.

"Quite a pretty little conspiracy," he said. "How in the name of G.o.d do you expect me to do anything with the entire household united against me? Tell me that."

"Exactly," said Miss Cornelia. "And if we are united against you, why should I have sent for you? You might tell me that, too."

He turned on Bailey savagely.

"What did you mean by that 'three hours more'?" he demanded.

"I could have cleared myself in three hours," said Bailey with calm despair.

Beresford laughed mockingly--a laugh that seemed to sear into Bailey's consciousness like the touch of a hot iron. Again he turned frenziedly upon the young lawyer--and Anderson was just preparing to hold them away from each other, by force if necessary, when the doorbell rang.

For an instant the ringing of the bell held the various figures of the little scene in the rigid postures of a waxworks tableau--Bailey, one foot advanced toward Beresford, his hands balled up into fists--Beresford already in an att.i.tude of defense--the detective about to step in between them--Miss Cornelia stiff in her chair--Dale over by the fireplace, her hand at her heart. Then they relaxed, but not, at least on the part of Bailey and Beresford, to resume their interrupted conflict. Too many nerve-shaking things had already happened that night for either of the young men not to drop their mutual squabble in the face of a common danger.

"Probably the Doctor," murmured Miss Cornelia uncertainly as the doorbell rang again. "He was to come back with some sleeping-powders."

Billy appeared for the key of the front door.

"If that's Doctor Wells," warned the detective, "admit him. If it's anybody else, call me."

Billy grinned acquiescently and departed. The detective moved nearer to Bailey.

"Have you got a gun on you?"

"No." Bailey bowed his head.

"Well, I'll just make sure of that." The detective's hands ran swiftly and expertly over Bailey's form, through his pockets, probing for concealed weapons. Then, slowly drawing a pair of handcuffs from his pocket, he prepared to put them on Bailey's wrists.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THE SIGN OF THE BAT

But Dale could bear it no longer. The sight of her lover, beaten, submissive, his head bowed, waiting obediently like a common criminal for the detective to lock his wrists in steel broke down her last defenses. She rushed into the center of the room, between Bailey and the detective, her eyes wild with terror, her words stumbling over each other in her eagerness to get them out.

"Oh, no! I can't stand it! I'll tell you everything!" she cried frenziedly. "He got to the foot of the stair-case--Richard Fleming, I mean," she was facing the detective now, "and he had the blue-print you've been talking about. I had told him Jack Bailey was here as the gardener and he said if I screamed he would tell that. I was desperate. I threatened him with the revolver but he took it from me.

Then when I tore the blue-print from him--he was shot--from the stairs--"

"By Bailey!" interjected Beresford angrily.

"I didn't even know he was in the house!" Bailey's answer was as instant as it was hot. Meanwhile, the Doctor had entered the room, hardly noticed, in the middle of Dale's confession, and now stood watching the scene intently from a post by the door.

"What did you do with the blue-print?" The detective's voice beat at Dale like a whip.

"I put it first in the neck of my dress--" she faltered. "Then, when I found you were watching me, I hid it somewhere else."

Her eyes fell on the Doctor. She saw his hand steal out toward the k.n.o.b of the door. Was he going to run away on some pretext before she could finish her story? She gave a sigh of relief when Billy, re-entering with the key to the front door, blocked any such attempt at escape.