The porcelain mask A detective story

"There's just one way that you can prove that you are giving us straight goods, Haskins," he said, "and that's to tell us who came out of the room." Don Haskins closed his eyes again, and a queer, crooked, mirthless grimace caught up the corners of his mouth, a grimace all the more horrible because a fresh trickle of crimson seeped across his lips and trickled down his unshaven chin. Whether he had begun his story with the intention of ending it at this most unsatisfactory point, or whether the abrupt termination was a matter of sudden decision, can never be known. "She--she was--no good," he told them in an almost inaudible whisper. "She--she made a bum outta me when--when she gimme the go-by. She made that Sarbella kid do a Dutch, and she handed Gilmore--a mean wallop. She got--what was comin' to her. If I wasn't gonna croak--I'd have to talk to save--my own self; but I ain't gonna make no trouble--for nobody--on account--killin' her. That's all you get--from me." "He's lying!" gritted Tish. "Sure he's lying. He killed her." But Wiggly Price was not so sure. If Haskins, as it seemed, knew he was dying, why should he lie? There was one possibility why he should; it might have occurred to him that he still had a chance to cheat death, and he had cunningly concocted this yarn out of the whole cloth. Thoughts and theories leaped through Wiggly's mind. If Haskins' story, improbable as it sounded, were true, the Greenacres mystery had been returned to its first status, and suspicion returned even more strongly to Victor Sarbella. Guilt lay between the artist and Joan Sheridan. Again the newspaper man thought of the girl's agitation when told that suspicion had turned away from Sarbella, her relief and yet bewilderment when she had heard that circumstances pointed to Haskins, the crook; and he thought, too, of the black hairpin. "You're lying, Haskins," Tish said again; "but what gets me is that you didn't make a break for it after the shooting." The wounded man stirred slightly. "I--I tried--to make--my get-away," he whispered, "but there was two guys comin' up the front stairs, an' I hadda dodge back--to--the attic." "Haskins," burst out Wiggly, "the person you saw coming out of that room--was it a man or a woman?" But Don Haskins shook his head feebly. He made no other response. A little later, while Tish still plied insistent and exasperated questions, the man's body twitched and relaxed; then a gush of crimson poured from his mouth. "He's dying!" cried Wiggly and made a leap toward the door to summon Doctor Bushnell. It was too late. Haskins' eyes had opened and were fixed glassily upon the ceiling. He was dying with his last, stubborn silence unbroken; and the Gilmore tragedy was yet to be solved. CHAPTER XXV THE SKEPTICISM OF SERGEANT TISH The doctor had found Constable Griggs' injury worse than he had anticipated, for Haskins had struck a vicious blow with the doorknob wickedly concealed within the toe of his sock; there was a bad skull fracture that threatened fatal results. With Bates to help him, Doctor Bushnell had placed Ham Griggs upon the discarded couch and had just completed a painstaking examination, when Wiggly Price came pounding up the third floor stairs to the storeroom. "Quick, doc!" panted the newspaper man. "Haskins is dying; he's got another hemorrhage--a worse one. I'm afraid he's a goner." The doctor motioned to the butler. "You stay here with the constable, Bates," he ordered. "I'll be back in a moment; we've got to get this man to the hospital. He's dangerously hurt, Price; a bad skull fracture." As he spoke, he was following the reporter back down the stairs. "I'm not surprised about Haskins. But there was nothing more than I could do for him, and Griggs needed me, too." "The other doctor, the surgeon, you telephoned for----" "Is operating at a hospital in New York this morning; I was unable to reach him. But, for that matter, I do not believe any human agency could have saved Haskins. Perhaps, after all, it's better this way; circumstances are doing what the State would doubtless have done--exacted his life in payment." They had reached the door of the guest room. Sergeant Tish still sat in his chair beside the bed; he turned slowly, painfully. "You're too late," he said. Doctor Bushnell stepped forward, was silent for moment; then he inclined his head. "Yes," he agreed. "I'm too late, but it doesn't matter; even an operation was a forlorn hope. I could not have kept him alive; nothing could have done that, I think." He stared down at the dead man's contorted features. "An evil face," he murmured. "An evil end for an evil life. Did he make a confession, sergeant?" "No, confound his stubbornness!" growled Sergeant Tish. "He gave us a wild kind of yarn that explained his connection with the Gilmore woman, his hold on her, and how he got into the house, but denied that he did the shooting. Of course he was lying." Doctor Bushnell nodded. "He killed her--certainly," he agreed. "The way he knocked out Griggs and shot you is proof that he was a cold-blooded killer. What was the hold that he had over the dead woman?" "She was Haskins' wife--his legal wife." The physician gasped and, thinking of the beautiful Helen Gilmore, stared down at the hideous face of the dead criminal, with a look of amazement that bordered upon incredulity. "What--the wife of that man? It seems absurd, absolutely preposterous! I find it next to impossible to believe it. Then, when she married Kirklan, she----" "Committed bigamy," finished Sergeant Tish with a jerk of his head that sent another stab of pain through his wounded shoulder. "That's it, doctor; and that is what gave him a hold on her--why he was able to have her visit him at Eighth Avenue Annie's day before yesterday, give him money and agree to give him still more; that was why he fled to her for protection and was hiding when I stumbled onto him. I guess that part of it is true, all right. "Perhaps not so amazing as it would seem. Haskins was not always the bum he is now. They used to call him Nifty Don in his palmy days; he's hit the skids since then. He blames her for slipping; she threw him over, as I got it. I wish you'd take a look at this shoulder of mine, doc; the wound is throbbing like a sixty-horse-power engine." Doctor Bushnell murmured a hasty apology for neglecting him so long. "I'll have a look at that right now, Sergeant Tish. Three emergency cases all at one time is a big order for a doctor. Price, will you get my kit from the third floor? I'm hoping there's enough gauze and bandages to do." "The constable come around all right?" asked Tish, as the newspaper man hurried from the room. "A bad skull fracture, sergeant, where Haskins struck him a terrific blow on the side of the head. I'm taking him to the hospital just as quickly as I've got you patched up a bit. You, too, if there is need." "Don't think it'll be necessary, doc. Lord, what a wild morning it's been!" He gritted his teeth, as the physician slipped down the coat sleeve and began ripping away the shirt. "What's happened to Gilmore? Strange that he didn't show up with all the racket." "Probably asleep under the influence of the opiate that I gave him to relax his strain," answered Doctor Bushnell. "He's one of those high-strung, emotional fellows, and I couldn't risk too much nervous tension with him. He was on the verge of a collapse. Poor devil! He's a good sort; doesn't deserve what that woman has done to him." Wiggly returned with the doctor's kit, and Bushnell began to work swiftly; the wound in the detective's shoulder had bled but little. The bullet, he found, had struck the collar bone at a deflecting angle, plowing for a brief distance along the top of the clavicle, where it was imbedded just beneath the skin. "You're a lucky man, Sergeant Tish," grunted the doctor. "If that had been a little lower there would have been the very devil to pay. The worst danger is that the bone has been cracked, and I do not think it has been. This treatment, of course, is only temporary; I'll look after you again later." It was the work of but a few minutes to make a shallow incision which removed the bullet, cauterize the wound, and apply dressings. "I shall take Griggs to the hospital in my car," said Bushnell, as he finished. "The butler can go along with me. We'll be back within an hour or so--just as soon as I can manage it. I suppose Sarbella will have to stay in jail until Griggs recovers consciousness and releases him." Wiggly broke a considerable silence. "It's my notion," he said, "that Sarbella had better stay right where he is until--well, until the case has been cleared up completely." The doctor stared in surprise. "What do you mean by that?" he exclaimed. "Not that there's any doubt but Haskins killed the woman?" "Not the slightest doubt that Haskins did it," Tish declared in a positive tone. "I don't take any stock in his story--that is, the part of it in which he denied doing the shooting. I suppose the rest of it is straight enough." Doctor Bushnell looked reprovingly at the newspaper man. "I must say," he said severely, "that you are a most perverse young man. When the weight of all the evidence was strictly against Sarbella, you were trying to prove his innocence. Yet now, when the discovery and capture of this desperate criminal--the legal husband of the dead woman--makes it practically certain that Haskins was the murderer, you suddenly change front and----" "Perhaps it's because I've got more faith in the truth of Haskins' story than Sergeant Tish has," broke in Wiggly Price. "In my mind the case against Sarbella is stronger than ever--circumstantially. But, with what we've got, I don't think for a minute that a jury would ever convict him. Haskins' account of things does explain how Sarbella, or"--he hesitated cautiously--"or some other person might have got possession of the gun." "Or some other person!" exclaimed the doctor impatiently. "Tut, Price, don't be such an utter ass. I've something more important to do than listen to a new crop of empty theories. What other person, pray, have you in mind?" Wiggly felt that any mention of Joan Sheridan would arouse the physician's antagonism; moreover it would serve no purpose. So he chose the wise course of answering the question only with a shrug of the shoulders. "The constable is a heavy man, and the butler old and rather feeble," he said, abruptly switching the subject; "perhaps I'd better help you get him downstairs and into your car." "Yes; please," grunted Doctor Bushnell. Tish trailed along behind the two and waited on the second floor, while the physician and Wiggly went to the storeroom to carry down the unconscious Ham Griggs. "He hasn't moved a muscle since you left, Doctor Bushnell," reported the butler. "Except that I can see him breathing I'd think he was dead." The doctor issued brief, terse instructions, and he and Wiggly formed a human packsaddle by grasping each other's wrists. In this way, their heavy burden between them, they made their way down from the third floor, while Bates hurried off to get a supply of pillows for padding the tonneau of the doctor's car. "I was going to suggest that you come along," Bushnell suggested; but Wiggly shook his head. "No, I'd like to stay here," he answered. "Bates will do as well as I for your trip." "Oh, I see," the physician said shortly, "you want to gather some new theories about the tragedy. You're making a fool of yourself, Price; the case, thank Heaven, is solved." "Hope so, doctor, but that remains to be seen."