Only seven were hanged
sixty minutes before the husband arrived. There was plenty of time
to complete his scheme.
First he put the revolver into his pocket and pulled on his gloves.
They were yellow chamois gloves which could be washed. He stepped to
the bathroom and raised the lower half of the window as high as
possible. A fire-escape iron staircase passed just under the window,
near enough for an active man to enter or leave.
Seale went back to the parlor and tossed cushions about to make it
appear that a struggle had taken place. He cut the telephone cord.
He laid a valuable flower-vase on the hearth and smashed it with his
heel, letting the water run over the tiles and carpet. He upset a
chair or two. He did all this noiselessly.
He went into a bedroom and rummaged among the contents of a wardrobe.
He did the same with the dressing-table. He found several articles
of jewelry--a watch, a brooch, a string of pearls, a few rings.
These he put into his pocket, with the exception of the brooch, which
he laid carelessly on the step of the iron fire-escape nearest the
bathroom window.
He went into the dining-room and took a decanter of wine from the
sideboard. This he carried to the parlor. He took from his pocket
the small box containing the wineglass which he had brought with him,
extracting it as carefully as he had laid it there, by finger and
thumb on rim and base. He poured a little wine into the glass. As
he did so he smiled to himself.
Plainly marked on the glass were the fingerprints of Adam Jelks, the
ex-burglar, his valet.
The glass was of the same pattern as the others on the sideboard.
Seale had seen to that, by getting one some time previously so that
he might match it, on the pretense that he liked the design. But he
had not matched it. He had merely obtained Jelks's fingerprints.
When he had completed his arrangements he took a last look at the
dead woman. She was lovely even in death. If only she had been
unfaithful!
She lay with her crochet work still clasped in her hands, and her
workbag had dropped from her chair to the floor. Did Seale feel
regret? He regretted, at any rate, that she had refused to listen to
him. He walked to the door; but just as he was in the act of opening
it he remembered that he had left his walking-stick in a corner of
the parlor. That would have been fatal. He returned, lifted the
stick, and, stepping over the dead woman, took a last look around.
There was nothing he had forgotten, nothing he had omitted, nothing
he had left undone. He had accomplished what every criminal hopes
one day to accomplish--the perfect crime!
There was not a trace of his presence, not an item that would lead to
him. Everything would lead to Adam Jelks. He opened the door and
stepped out to the corridor. The passage was deserted. He began to
descend the carpeted stairs.
Was he not perfectly secure? Had he not carried out the murder with
absolute excellence, with consummate ingenuity? Not a blemish could
be found in his mode of action. The police would find the wineglass
and would observe the fingerprints. Adam Jelks would be arrested.
Would not the past career of Adam Jelks rise up and convict him--or
at least aid toward a conviction? Seale himself would give evidence,
since he had been the last to employ the ex-convict. He would, with
seeming reluctance, relate the incident of the valuable shirt-studs;
he would tell how he had therefore dismissed Jelks before going to
Paris. In this connection he had but one more item to fill in and
the picture would be complete. It would be the high spot that
artists always add last, but it would throw the whole scene into
proper perspective. He would write to the Prisoners' Rescue Guild
and inform them, with regret, of the studs and his action. He would
do this before he took his suitcase and drove off to catch the night
express to Dover. As for his swindle, the husband of the dead woman
would be too busy to worry about financial matters for the time
being; when he did get the true position he would be hit. Seale
would be all right.
Walter Seale entered his own flat, leaving his front wooden door open
as usual. The vestibule door closed softly on its catch. He sat
down at his desk and laid a sheet of notepaper on the blotter in
front of him. There was no real hurry for the letter, which he had
not already written because of his hope that the woman would
surrender. The boat train did not leave yet awhile. He smoked a
cigarette with satisfaction and enjoyment, lingering over every
whiff. His only emotion was regret that the woman had refused him to
the last.
Finally he lifted his pen to write the letter; and as he stretched
his arm toward the inkwell the vestibule door was thrown open. Two
men appeared on the threshold. One was the husband of the woman,
disheveled and agitated. The other was a policeman.
"What do you want?"
Seale was quite calm as he turned toward them, pen in hand.
Both men stepped toward him. It was the policeman who spoke.
"There's been trouble. This gentleman's wife has been murdered. He
brought me here. I want a word with you."
"Why come to me about this?" asked Seale. "Murdered, you say? That
is terrible news----"
"Have you been up at her flat?"
"Me? No, I haven't been near the place. I've been here all day----"
The policeman took a step nearer.
"Then how do you explain this?" he demanded, pointing to the floor.
Walter Seale could not suppress a cry of dismay when he looked down.
Caught in the spat on his right foot was a silk thread that trailed
along the floor behind him. The policeman was speaking again.
"We followed it down. The other end of that silk is in a ball wedged
between the dead woman and the leg of a table. It isn't easily
broken, that stuff. I'm going to search you now for the weapon that
killed her."
And thus, instead of going to Paris, Walter Seale spent that night,
after the search, in a police cell.
A silken cord had trapped him. It was the hangman's coarser rope
that hanged him.
CHAPTER VIII
_The Judge States His Fourth Case_
"And do you seriously mean to put forward a plea to the effect that
the penal code should not hang such a foul murderer as Walter Seale?"
asked the judge, when the waiter had finished his story.
"Pardon me, but it is very exhausting to be constantly bringing your
lordship back to the point at issue," returned the waiter, coughing
to clear his throat. "It would not be impossible to argue against
the judgment of death even in Seale's case. But the issue before us
in this instance is not what you suggest."
"What is the issue, my friend?" asked the judge, condescendingly and
with a rare and sardonic smile.
"If you recollect, it is perfectly simple. You gave the case of
Nathaniel Gore to prove that the death penalty acted as a deterrent."
"Well?"
"Really, you make me tired. The real reason there has not been any
further attempt to steal diamonds brought from abroad by ships is
that the people who send the diamonds, and the people who receive
them, have adopted new methods of transit; or, if they still send
them by that line of ships, they have so many guards and take so many
precautions that a thief stands no chance at all. I include all
precious stones--from Burma, India, South Africa. Recently a
consignment of gems came to England by airplane. Well, well, what
does it matter? Gem thieves are only human. That is why there are
no more big thefts on board ship. And yet that is not the issue
between us in these two stories of Gore and Seale."
"Well?" asked the judge again, this time a little heavily.
"The plain issue is whether the penal code stops murder by being a
deterrent. My answer is this: You sentenced Nathaniel Gore to be
hanged. The news was told by newspaper, by wireless broadcast; in
fact, everybody knew it. You yourself remarked on the public, and
feminine, interest in his case. Very well. Do you realize that the
murder that Walter Seale committed _was committed the very next day_?
Seale knew of the verdict in Gore's case. Did that deter him? And
that is my answer to your plea. So I claim another two points."
He added two more glasses to his list before the astonished eyes of
the judge.
"I am sorry your lordship hasn't put up a better defense," he smiled.
"Really, you know, for a judge of your lordship's eminence your lack
of observation is deplorable. You went on your holiday after
sentencing Gore. Do you never read the newspapers? Do you never
read the minutes of your own intellectual club? Really! Really!"
The judge flushed under the sneering taunt. He could have sentenced
the waiter there and then to life imprisonment!
"It is useless for me to combat your decision," he grumbled, resolved
not to show any anger or disappointment at the ending of the cases,
though he was terribly grieved that he had not been allowed one
point. "What is the use of discussing legal matters with you when
you have the result already decided? But let us waive that"--for an
ugly look came into the waiter's eyes--"and allow me to say that I am
not so deficient in observation as you suppose."
"No?"
"You stated that Walter Seale knew of the verdict in the case of
Nathaniel Gore. It would be interesting to have proof of that
assertion."
"I can give you proof."
"Indeed? Incontrovertible proof?"
"Absolutely."
"Let me hear it."
"I myself handed the morning newspaper to Walter Seale and pointed
the verdict out to him."
"You?" The judge half rose from his chair.
"Then you are----"
"Adam Jelks!" bowed the waiter.
"Good God!" exclaimed the judge, sinking back into his chair.
"Merely one of my aliases."
The phrase sounded reminiscent in the judge's ears.
"You said the words when you claimed to be Lorry Black," he murmured
in a dazed way. "Lorry Black! Adam Jelks! Which is your real name,
may I ask?"
"Neither is my real name."
"But the police records----"
"Bear a third alias, the first name by which they knew me. You see,
I am frank."
"Disastrously so. What, then, is your real name?"
"Gently! Gently! Why press for it?"
"I am curious."
"All in good time."
Once more the sound of music and singing broke on their ears.
Another band of Christmas waits were in the street. They were
obviously trained singers and players, and the words of their carol
came melodiously out of the night:
"_Peace on earth, good will to men._"
In spite of themselves both the judge and the waiter listened to the
soft, sweet strain. Gradually the music died down, the waits moved
on to another street, but they could be heard singing faintly in the
distance. In time the waits moved out of hearing. There was not a
sound in the large room. The candles had burned more than half their
length to their bases, and the light from them, added to the ruddy
flare of the fire in the grate, cast a queer illumination on the
figures of the sleeping members.
The waiter shrugged his shoulders and tapped the table with the
bludgeon to call the judge's attention.
"Do you feel inclined to make another attempt to score a point, your
lordship?"
The judge awoke out of a revery into which he had been plunged.
"Is it worth my while, sir?"
"That is for you to decide."
"The dice are loaded against me. You have decided the end, it seems,
so that whatever I may say----"
"Come, come, do not be so melancholy. I assure you I was prepared to
act impartially if you had been able to convince me of the justice of
your views."
The judge glanced at the array of glasses in front of his antagonist,
then his gaze strayed to the windows. His hand fumbled at his
waistcoat and drew out his watch.