Part 8 (1/2)
Collins looked at his wife, and even he felt the spell. It was not crime that she had done; it was elemental justice.
For a moment she stood, silent, facing Kennedy. Then the colour slowly faded from her cheeks. She reeled.
Collins caught her and imprinted a kiss, the kiss that for years she had longed and striven for again. She looked rather than spoke forgiveness as he held her and showered them on her.
”Before Heaven,” I heard him whisper into her ear, ”with all my power as a lawyer I will free you from this.”
Gently Dr. Leslie pushed him aside and felt her pulse as she dropped limply into the only easy chair in the laboratory.
”O'Connor,” he said at length, ”all the evidence that we really have hangs on an invisible thread of quartz a mile away. If Professor Kennedy agrees, let us forget what has happened here to-night. I will direct my jury to bring in a verdict of suicide. Collins, take good care of her.” He leaned over and whispered so she could not hear. ”I wouldn't promise her six weeks otherwise.”
I could not help feeling deeply moved as the newly reunited Collinses left the laboratory together. Even the bluff deputy, O'Connor, was touched by it and under the circ.u.mstances did what seemed to him his higher duty with a tact of which I had believed him scarcely capable.
Whatever the ethics of the case, he left it entirely to Dr. Leslie's coroner's jury to determine.
Burke Collins was already making hasty preparations for the care of his wife so that she might have the best medical attention to prolong her life for the few weeks or months before nature exacted the penalty which was denied the law.
”That's a marvellous piece of apparatus,” I remarked, standing over the connections with the string galvanometer, after all had gone. ”Just suppose the case had fallen into the hands of some of these old-fas.h.i.+oned detectives--”
”I hate post-mortems--on my own cases,” interrupted Kennedy brusquely.
”To-morrow will be time enough to clear up this mess. Meanwhile, let us get this thing out of our minds.”
He clapped his hat on his head decisively and deliberately walked out of the laboratory, starting off at a brisk pace in the moonlight across the campus to the avenue where now the only sound was the noisy rattle of an occasional trolley car.
How long we walked I do not know. But I do know that for genuine relaxation after a long period of keen mental stress, there is nothing like physical exercise. We turned into our apartment, roused the sleepy hall-boy, and rode up.
”I suppose people think I never rest,” remarked Kennedy, carefully avoiding any reference to the exciting events of the past two days.
”But I do. Like every one else, I have to. When I am working hard on a case--well, I have my own violent reaction against it--more work of a different kind. Others choose white lights, red wines and blue feelings afterwards. But I find, when I reach that state, that the best anti-toxin is something that will chase the last case from your brain by getting you in trim for the next unexpected event.”
He had sunk into an easy chair where he was running over in his mind his own plans for the morrow.
”Just now I must recuperate by doing no work at all,” he went on slowly undressing. ”That walk was just what I needed. When the fever of dissipation comes on again, I'll call on you. You won't miss anything, Walter.”
Like the famous Finnegan, however, he was on again and gone again in the morning. This time I had no misgivings, although I should have liked to accompany him, for on the library table he had scrawled a little note, ”Studying East Side to-day. Will keep in touch with you.
Craig.” My daily task of transcribing my notes was completed and I thought I would run down to the Star to let the editor know how I was getting along on my a.s.signment.
I had scarcely entered the door when the office boy thrust a message into my hand. It stopped me even before I had a chance to get as far as my own desk. It was from Kennedy at the laboratory and bore a time stamp that showed that it must have been received only a few minutes before I came in.
”Meet me at the Grand Central,” it read, ”immediately.”
Without going further into the office, I turned and dropped down in the elevator to the subway. As quickly as an express could take me, I hurried up to the new station.
”Where away?” I asked breathlessly, as Craig met me at the entrance through which he had reasoned I would come. ”The coast or Down East?”
”Woodrock,” he replied quickly, taking my arm and dragging me down a ramp to the train that was just leaving for that fas.h.i.+onable suburb.
”Well,” I queried eagerly, as the train started. ”Why all this secrecy?”